MAPLE PARK — Roughly 24 hours after turning in their highest scoring output of the season on Monday, the Rochelle Hubs faced a whole new animal on Tuesday, when the purple and white were held to 11 first-half points during their varsity basketball matchup against Kaneland.

Facing a Knights team that has lost just one game this season, Rochelle had nowhere to go on offense in the opening half, where Kaneland’s combined length and athleticism created havoc for the Hubs, who put home only three combined field goals in the first and second quarters. Behind 6-foot-9 sophomore Jeffrey Hassan and 6-foot-7 senior Freddy Hassan, who eclipsed 1,000 career points on Tuesday, the Knights handed Rochelle a lopsided 75-40 defeat.

“It wasn’t that we didn’t know what we were in for,” head coach Tim Thompson said. “That’s a team that has aspirations to play for a supersectional. They have tremendous length across the front line and they have an All-State point guard… They can make up a lot of ground and even when they aren’t playing weak side defense, they can guard really hard because they have great rim protection and we had a tremendously difficult time running our offense tonight.”

Kaneland’s star-studded trio carried the load on Tuesday. Junior guard and former Aurora Christian standout Marshawn Cocroft scored a game-high 16 points, while Jeffrey Hassan added 14 points including an alley-oop dunk in the first half and a pair of two-handed jams during the second half. Freddy Hassan tallied 12 points, with 10 coming in the first quarter. 

“We have to wash this one,” Thompson said. “We’ve played a lot of good games recently and it was the second of a back-to-back. We need to have a good film session tomorrow and we’re watching three games in Ottawa, Streator and Kaneland who have played us really well in the half-court offense. We need to see what we’re doing on offense and where we can get better.”

Kaneland scored nearly all of its points around the rim during the first quarter, where the Knights built a 24-8 lead behind Cocroft and the Hassan brothers. Despite a small spark from senior guard Elijah Harley, who tallied six of his 10 points in the first half, Rochelle had minimal room to operate in the second quarter, where Kaneland held the Hubs to just three points and one made shot. The Knights (23-1, 7-0 Interstate 8) entered the locker room with a 46-11 halftime lead.

Although the game was largely out of reach by halftime, Rochelle came out looking to score in the third quarter, where freshman guard Cohen Haedt and senior guard Carson Lewis each buried 3-pointers on offense. The Hub defense had no answers for the Knights, however, as Kaneland finished nine shots around the basket to enter the fourth quarter with a 64-25 lead.

“The kids were a bit looser in the second half and we tried to make the clear at the start of the game,” Thompson said. “They backed off of us a little bit defensively and they gave us some shots. It was only a matter of time for our kids to feel OK about it and they made some shots.”

Lewis sank another triple in the fourth quarter to finish with a team-high 12 points for the Hubs (8-17, 1-6 Interstate 8), who will head south for a conference game at Morris on Saturday.