Forest Hills Northern Battles Past Rockford
By Jeff Chaney / The Grand Rapids Press

LOWELL -- For the third time this year the Forest Hills Northern boys basketball team grinded out a win over the Rockford Rams. The Huskies beat Rockford 52-37 in a Class A semifinal at Lowell on Thursday night. Forest Hills Northern advances to the championship game, where it will play Forest Hills Central on Saturday night at 7 p.m.

Strong second and fourth quarters were the key for the Huskies, as the outscored Rockford 12-6 in each of those quarters. Senior forward Travis Worst was a big part of the two key quarters, especially in the fourth quarter when he scored six points in 26 seconds with just under two minutes to play that put the game away.
" Travis has been doing that for us all year," Forest Hills Northern coach Steve Harvey said. "He has been coming up big like that all year, and we needed that tonight, because we didn't do a lot of big things in that fourth quarter. We didn't hit our free throws and didn't handle their pressure real well."

The Huskies did commit several turnovers, and were only 4-of-10 from the free-throw line. The problem for Rockford was it was cold from the field, and especially from behind the 3-point line where the Rams were 3-of-19. " The key was, we were three of 19 from behind the 3-point line," Rockford coach Steve Majerle said. "And we have to shoot the ball well to beat this team. We had good looks, but didn't hit them. But that's how it goes when you shoot from the perimeter, if it goes well it's great, but when it goes bad, it's bad."

Rockford ended up shooting 13 of 42 from the field. The Huskies were 19-of-36 from the field, but were 9-of-19 from the free-throw line. " At times there, we played not to lose," Harvey said. "But we did enough to win, and that is key at this time of the year."

Worst led all scorers with 17 points. Center Pedja Lazic added 13 points. Josh Rauser led Rockford in scoring with 11 points.