Chepke’s 24 points power Fitch to win

February 11, 2012 at 12:00a.m.

HOWLAND

The way things started Friday night at Howland High, it looked like the host Tigers boys basketball team and Fitch were on their way to a repeat of their high-scoring first meeting from mid-January.

The Tigers won that game, 86-84, after jumping out to an early lead. But in the rematch, things slowed down in the second half after the teams combined for 73 points in the first half.

Fitch was able to close out the game with a 15-6 run for a 66-59 All-American Conference American Division victory.

“In game one, they came out and pretty much punched us right in the face. It was 23-14 them,” Fitch coach Brian Beany said. “We kind of were like deer in the headlights a little bit the first game with their aggressiveness, they got after us.

“In this game, we got out, we ran, we pushed the ball and had one of our better first halves we’ve had all year. We used our athletic ability to get the ball down the floor and take it to the hoop.”

Seniors Dan Chepke (24 points) and Will Mahone (17 points) led the Fitch offense and sophomore point guard Jessie Driver was a huge contributor with nine points, 11 assists and 11 rebounds. Nick Williams added nine points.

Howland got 19 points and five assists from Arbie Murray, 13 points from John-Mark Weisman and 12 points and seven rebounds from Brendan Cope.

After falling behind 5-0, the Falcons (9-8, 5-4 American Divison) went on a 23-8 run and led 23-15 at the quarter break. The lead was 26-15 before Howland (10-7, 6-3) fought its way back, taking a 35-34 lead.

Fitch then scored the last four points of the half for a 38-35 halftime advantage.

“Our transition defense was just absolutely horrible,” Howland coach Bill Bogan said. “I don’t know how many they shot in the first quarter but we gave up lay-up after lay-up in transition defense.

“You let a team come on the road and shoot lay-ups early in a basketball game, they’re going to make the lay-ups and that leads to good shooting.”

Fitch again established a 10-point lead, 49-39, in the third quarter before a Howland flurry in the final minute cut the lead to 49-47.

The Tigers regained the lead, 53-51, with 4:28 remaining before the Falcons went on their game-winning run.

“In the second half we just kind of persevered, their zone hurt us a little bit, it kind of slowed us down,” Beany said. “Down the stretch we made some free throws and closed out the win.

“Every game we’ve played except two have been within six points. Everything’s been close so you can look at little things here and there we need to do better, or that the other team just did better than us.

“The last two games we’ve shot free throws well. Tonight we were fairly decent and in the end it comes down to a free throw shooting contest.