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It’s been a rough start for the Dupo Tiger Varsity Boys Basketball team. After opening the season with three straight losses in the Metro East Lutheran Thanksgiving Tournament the Tigers bounced back with consecutive wins against Gillespie in the 7th place game at the tournament and then their home opener against Brussels. But after two disappointing losses against conference foes Marissa and Lebanon one might ask, are the Tigers back where they started at the beginning of the season? Only time will tell for sure.
Going into Friday night’s game against a highly touted Lebanon team, the Tigers weren’t given much of a chance especially after the 74-45 beating they took at the hands of the Marissa Meteors earlier in the week. But the Tigers took it to the Greyhounds and for most of the first half held their own against the highly favored Lebanon squad. The first quarter saw the Tigers matching the Greyhounds point for point as Lebanon held a slim one point lead, 18-17, after the first quarter. But everything changed in the second quarter.
The Tigers came out in the second quarter and took the lead 22-18 with six minutes left in the half. And then it seemed like someone just flipped a switch that turned on the Greyhounds team. The tempo changed in their favor and the Greyhounds were suddenly all over the Tigers beating them in every facet of the game. In less than a minute Lebanon took the lead away from the Tigers going up 25-24 with five minutes left in the half on their way to a 28-8 run to close out the first half leading the Tigers 46-30. Dupo Tiger Varsity Boys basketball coach Matt Carpenter said, “We knew in order for us to have a chance to win the game we had to control the tempo. And with the exception of that second quarter stretch I felt we did that.”
The Greyhounds continued their domination in the second half. Lebanon’s victory was rooted in rebounding, defense and speed. The Tigers had no answer for the way the Lebanon squad moved the ball down court so quickly off the rebound. When the Greyhounds were fouled shooting the ball they finished. They made their lay-ups and converted on free throw attempts to complete their rout of the Tigers 78-61. Coach Carpenter said, “They are the team we thought they were. They run the floor really well, they pressure the ball and force turnovers and then take advantage of the mistakes. They’ve got five guys on the floor at any time that just go all out. From what we’ve seen they go deep on the bench using up to ten players in the game.”
Kaleb Anderson was once again Dupo’s leading scorer with 22 points on the night. Caleb Tatum had 15 points for the Tigers while Kevin Steinhauer contributed 13 points. Dupo was 10 of 18 from the free throw line while Lebanon was 12 of 14 from the line. Lebanon also had four players in double figures for the Greyhounds. But if you take away the second quarter, the Tigers were outscored by only two points in the remaining three quarters. Coach Carpenter said, “We had that one bad stretch in the second quarter, if you take that away you see we were only down by one in the first quarter and they only outscored us by one point in the second half. So that second quarter stretch was the ball game.”
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