TURNER — Leavitt’s defense was quick to the ball and forced missed shots throughout the first half of Thursday’s KVAC boys basketball matchup against Maranacook. All of Maranacook’s shots, in fact, missed, but one.
It was the difference in the game, as the Hornets gave up just one made basket to the Black Bears in the first two quarters on their way to a 58-30 victory at home.
“I told the kids in the locker room that that was one of the best defensive performances I’ve seen on this floor,” Leavitt coach Mike Hathaway said. “That’s a pretty good team, pretty good shooters, really good coach, and they’re coming off two big wins. You hold them to a bucket in a half, that’s about as good as it gets.”
The Hornets (6-1) got things going on offense quickly, jumping out to a 5-0 lead. Maranacook’s Jacob McLaughlin hit a layup to make it 5-2 with 5:30 left in the first quarter and it would end up being the only points scored by the Black Bears (2-3) until Keagan McClure hit a 3-pointer at the 5:42 mark of the third quarter.
Leavitt scored only those five points in the first quarter but got some offense going in the second quarter thanks to four points from Ian Redstone and a 3-pointer from Degan Jordan. The Hornets entered the locker room at halftime with a 16-2 lead.
Maranacook got 3-pointers from McClure, McLaughlin and Brandon Chilton in the third and scored 13 in the quarter.
On the other side, Leavitt’s offense found a groove and Jordan scored six of Leavitt’s 18 points in the third while Hunter Hayes added four of his own.
Leavitt had eight different players score Thursday night.
“We’ve been pretty versatile on defense,” Hathaway said. “We’ve been able to defend a lot of different types of teams in a lot of ways, so I liked our defense and I also liked that we scored 42 in the second half. That for us was good. We struggled a little with pressure but tonight we handled it well. I think we’ve had five different leading scorers in seven games. It’s not like the last couple years where one or two guys are going to score a ton; we want the good matchup and the open shot. It’s good to see us execute and move the ball tonight.”
The players are OK with sharing the scoring load as well.
“It feels great,” Leavitt’s Brett Coburn added. “We are spreading the ball out. We don’t have one star player, so we’re playing as a team more than we ever have. I’ve played on a lot of basketball teams and this is probably one of my favorites because of how much of a team we are. I can rely on my teammates with everything and I know they’ll be there for me.”
Coburn scored six points in the first three quarters and added seven in the fourth quarter to finish with a game-high 13 points. Five of his points in the fourth came at the free-throw line as he got more aggressive in the paint.
Declan Giroux added eight points for Leavitt.
“It was more aggression for myself, my teammates, all over the floor,” Coburn said. “We realized that if we got it to the middle, we could kick it to basically any side of the court. It was mostly being aggressive.”
Maranacook’s Tyler Hreben scored six of his team-high eight points in the fourth quarter.
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