Boys basketball: Yorkville keeps pace with DeKalb with win over Spartans

YORKVILLE – Logan Habada had one of his better games for Yorkville Tuesday.

He hopes it's not his last.

Habada, Yorkville's senior guard, came down hard on another player's shoe in the first minute of the fourth quarter of the Foxes' 53-29 Northern Illinois Big 12 win over Sycamore.

Habada, who had a game-high 16 points, was down for a few minutes under a basket, then walked gingerly to the locker room. He returned before the game's end on crutches, his right ankle wrapped.

"Can't tell right now if it's just a sprain or if it's broken," Habada said from the postgame training table. "Got to wait for the swelling to go down. Wait and see."

Ethan Heinrich scored eight points for Sycamore (4-20, 2-10). Payton Picolotti had six rebounds.

Neither team played particularly crisp offensive basketball in the first half. Yorkville shot just 6-for-25, while Sycamore turned it over 14 times and trailed 18-13 at halftime.

The bottom, though, fell out on the Spartans after halftime.

"I don't know if we played well in the first half, it's more that they didn't quite play well, but we hung in there, we did some good things," Sycamore coach Ryan Picolotti said. "Second half we thought we needed to pick it up. That's when Yorkville came out and took it to us."

Sycamore finished with 26 turnovers.

"They've been a problem all year," Picolotti said.

Yorkville, meanwhile, remained a game behind DeKalb in the conference race. The Foxes finish the regular season Feb. 23 at the Barbs.

"Definitely nice to get a win, one we needed to win the conference," Habada said. "We can't lose again."

Until his hard fall, Habada gave the Foxes (16-8, 9-2) a much-needed lift.

He scored eight of his 16 points in the third quarter. Habada's back-to-back 3-pointers opened up what was a sleepy Tuesday evening game, getting Yorkville ahead 25-16.

"He's been a catalyst," Yorkville coach Mike Dunn said. "He was obviously shooting the ball well and I thought defensively it was one of his better games. We have 13 other guys that have an opportunity to step up now."

Habada's stepped up this year, whether coming off the bench or now starting.

He airballed his first 3-point try Tuesday, missed his second, but finished 5-for-10.

And he was inspired.

"We had a teammate just a close family member," Habada said. "This one was for him.

"It was a great night, first half was shaky and then second half my teammates found me. I finally shot the ball well."

Christian Payne added 11 points and Javell Moore had eight for Yorkville, which had a 10-game winning streak snapped Saturday in a one-point loss at Plainfield Central.