Zach Marini’s double-double leads Yorkville Christian past Ottawa into Plano Christmas Classic semifinals

PLANO – Whatever it takes.

That’s the attitude Yorkville Christian senior Zach Marini is bringing to the hardwood this winter for the Mustangs.

With that attitude on display during Thursday’s quarterfinal game against Ottawa at the Plano Christmas Classic, Marini posted a double-double to help lead a balanced attack in a 64-55 victory.

Marini scored 12 points and fought hard to win 13 rebounds.

“As a senior, and being a senior captain, I’m just trying to find my role on the team and do whatever it takes to win,” Marini said. “I value winning other than just the stat sheets. This team has a lot of potential of winning a state championship. I just want to help us reach that potential and whatever works. I’m just like trying to get rebounds, being scrappy and, of course, hitting shots along the way.”

Yorkville Christian coach Aaron Sovern was all ears before the season even started when Marini told him he was willing to step into whatever role would best benefit the team.

“He said, ‘Coach, I’ll do anything I need to do,’ and his rebounding numbers have jumped,” Sovern said. “He’s really stepped up and sacrificed for us this year. And as one of our captains with Brady [Sovern], they know this is their last year. So the experience they had from their sophomore year when they were pushed into the lineup when they weren’t ready, now it’s coming to fruition because we made all those deposits and now we’re able to get some withdrawals. And we now have some other guys getting this experience – Tray [Alford], Jordan [Purvis] and Kayden [Maxwell].”

Yorkville Christian (10-3) took a 31-18 lead into halftime after Marini’s long 3-pointer just before the buzzer.

“This was an upset seed-wise,” Sovern said of the sixth-seeded Mustangs defeating the third-seeded Pirates. “We didn’t think so, but it was an upset. Crazy game. We kept having opportunities where I thought we could stretch it out and they would make a play or we couldn’t finish something and we’d have four to five-point swings. So we left some points on the floor, but Ottawa is always super well coached, run their stuff well and play hard.”

Jayden Riley, who narrowly missed a triple-double with 15 points, nine assists and eight rebounds, scored a few seconds into the third quarter as the Mustangs continued to control the game deep into the third quarter. Riley also took two charges.

The Mustangs would take their biggest lead of the game at 48-31 after a three-point play from Jack Versluys with 2:43 remaining in the third quarter.

Ottawa (6-4) then came alive.

Aric Threadgill’s 3-pointer started the rally for the Pirates with 2:21 left in the third.

The senior punished the Mustangs from beyond the arc, knocking down two more 3s as well as scoring a traditional three-point play as the Pirates used a 20-3 run to pull within 53-51 after senior Evan Snook scored with 3:31 remaining in the game.

“We just dug too deep of a hole,” Ottawa coach Mark Cooper said. “We didn’t shoot it well in the first half, ran bad offense, and consequently got into a position that was going to be difficult to come back from.”

Alford missed a 3-point try on Yorkville Christian’s next possession, but the airball landed in the big hands of 6-foot-6 teammate Noah Aguado, who laid it in.

“You don’t have much margin for errors when you fall down by [17 points],” Cooper said. “The kids fought back and got it to within [two], but we weren’t able to make the necessary plays the last couple of minutes.”

Marini followed with a couple of free throws before Riley went coast to coast for a layup as the Mustangs countered Ottawa’s massive comeback with a late 6-0 run to take a 59-51 lead with 1:14 left.

A dunk from Owen Sanders got the Pirates to within 60-55 with 23 seconds left, but they wouldn’t get any closer.

Alford made four free throws the rest of the way to seal the victory.

“I’ve been pretty decent, but I don’t get to the line much,” Alford said. “But I’m ready to shoot free throws when I get them.”

Alford had 12 points and Noah Aguado, who battled foul trouble, had 10 points as the Mustangs had four score in double figures.

“Outside of Jayden [Riley], we don’t have guys with flashy numbers, per se,” Aaron Sovern said. “One night a guy will get six [points] because they were tight on the other guys and another guy will get 12, so everything balances out when you have seven to eight guys in that seven- to nine-point range, which we love because on any given night someone can go for 20. And we don’t talk about style points. At the end of the day, if we can end up with more points, that’s great.”

Threadgill led the Pirates with 16 points. Kyle Araujo had 13 points and 10 rebounds, Sanders had eight points and 13 rebounds, and Snook had six points and five assists.

“We have high-character kids that compete,” Cooper said. “I just have to do better coaching us offensively because in the first half, offensively, we weren’t executing at a level that we need to to have success.”