After playing five of their last six games at home, the Lake Center Christian School Tigers (7-3) ventured back out onto the road on Jan. 19 and suffered a tough 53-46 loss to Newcomerstown (5-7).
Brock Justice led LCCS with 24 points despite a tough shooting night (5-15 from the field) and added five rebounds as the Tigers had the edge on the glass by a 26-18 margin. The game began as several of the Tigers' contests have this year, with their opponent starting strong and building an early lead. Newcomerstown pushed its advantage to 15 at one point midway through the second quarter, but LCCS was able to chip away and get to within 12 points (27-15) at halftime.
"Newcomerstown has a tough style to play against, especially with a lead," LCCS coach AaronHinkle said when asked about his team trend of rallying from early deficits with their strong pressure defense.
"We felt like if we could get an early lead and force them to play from behind, that's not their strength,” he said. “But when they got ahead, they slowed things down, spread the floor and really took the air out of the ball, which made it tough for us to come back."
In spite of that challenge, LCCS was able to close to within four points in the fourth quarter. The crucial moment came on a missed free throw in a 1-and-1 opportunity, robbing the Tigers of the chance to close to within two points and sealing their fate. The free-throw miss was a rarity on the night, with LCCS hitting 15-21 from the line overall. The points from the line were a necessity on a night when they did not shoot especially well (28 percent), making just 13-46 from the field overall and 5-16 from 3-point range.
"Our rebound stats are a bit deceiving," Hinkle pointed out of the 26-18 edge. "We had 12 offensive rebounds, but that was also indicative of the fact that we didn't shoot as well as we usually do."
The rebounding edge was definitely earned, as LCCS gave up height to Newcomerstown at nearly every position and had to play much of the first half without their tallest player, 6'3 Charles McMullen, who found himself in early foul trouble and on the bench for almost all of the second quarter. In his place, the Tigers were forced to go with a collection of underclassmen who have little varsity experience and are still adjusting to the speed of the game, Hinkle admitted.
Even in a loss, the Tigers were able to take key lessons that will be valuable to their success in the latter part of the season.
"There were a lot of circumstances in first half, things we hadn't experienced this year, and we wanted to tell kids to keep battling," Hinkle said. "At the half, we made changes to our interior defense, explained to the kids that we needed to attack on offensive end and play a little tougher defensively. I felt okay with how we responded to that in the second half."
Hinkle identified junior point guard Austin Troyer as a key contributor who showed progress in the loss. With eight points and considerable success attacking the rim and penetrating the Newcomerstown defense, Troyer showed he is learning how to make the transition from being more of a passer and distributor last season to a scorer this season.
"I told Austin that he needs to be more aggressive in attacking the hoop and finishing inside, and he's starting to grasp that," Hinkle said.
Troyer's ball-handling skills were also key in LCCS committing only nine turnovers in the game, which allowed them to make their second-half run and get back into the game. In the end, their demise came because, as their coach pointed out, Newcomerstown was able to capitalize offensively on virtually every LCCS defensive error and conversely, the Trojans had enough size inside to compensate for any lapses in their perimeter defense. In the end, it was a tough loss to swallow for the Tigers in a game they felt they had a good shot to win.
"The guys were clearly disappointed after the game," Hinkle admitted. "They understood that we expect better. Ultimately, we felt like we let ourselves down, all of us, that let each other down.
You'll have growing pains, but you'd like to have them when you're winning. This is one of those growing pains you have to learn from and our kids are resilient. They'll bounce back.
The next two games for the Tigers are both significant challenges, with Div. II district finalist Marlington on Jan. 26 and a rematch with Div. IV regional finalist Youngstown Christian on Jan. 29.
