LaBrae too much for Newton Falls

December 23, 2015 at 12:08a.m.

Size, depth leads Vikings in Trumbull County rivalry

By BRIAN DZENIS

LEAVITTSBURG

LaBrae was too big and brought too many people for Newton Falls.

The Vikings (6-1) ended the Tigers’ perfect start to the season with a 61-53 victory using their size cause havoc on defense and score inside. The Vikings’ depth kept Newton Falls guessing, with three different players reaching double figures by getting hot at different points of the game.

“We want to be No. 1 and we did what we had to do, we moved the ball, played good defense and stopped one of the best kids around here,” LaBrae guard Carlton Brown said.

Brown was referring to Newton Falls’ Jaden Walton. Walton was coming off a 36-point performance against Champion last Friday and scored 20 points Tuesday night. Nearly half of those points came in the final minutes of the game when he made three consecutive 3-pointers for the Tigers (7-1).

“Taking him out of the game helped a lot, he’s a major part of that team,” Brown said. “We knew he would get hot sooner or later, but it was a little too late.”

Walton was shadowed by the Vikings’ Tariq Drake and Jason Downey taking turns covering him when not double- teaming him. Tigers coach Roy Sembach found few faults in Walton’s game, he didn’t try to do too much by himself and found the open man when double teamed. Newton Falls needed to take better advantage of the mismatches those double teams create, the coach said.

“We need to learn how to attack the basket when teams are face-guarding Jaden and double-teaming Jaden,” Sembach said. “Tonight, we had a lot of 4-on-3s and I thought we were tentative attacking the basket, they can score and they’ve shown they can score when they play more aggressively.”

The only other Newton Falls player to reach double figures was Noah Saurez with 14 points. For LaBrae, it was never the same person doing the scoring each quarter. Brown scored 12 of his team-high 16 points in the first quarter and Caelen Hyland also had the majority of his 11 points in the first quarter. Then in the second and third, the Vikings went inside to Logan Kiser, who finished with 14 points before point guard Mike Eakins took over in the fourth quarter, scoring six of his seven

“It’s been like that all year, it’s a sign of a great team when you can get a different leading scorer every night,” LaBrae coach Chad Kiser said. “If teams want to take away our guard play, we can pound it inside.”

LaBrae did most of its damage in the opening minutes of each half, starting the game with a 12-2 run in the first quarter and then opened the third quarter with a 10-2 run.

The Vikings win broke a recent trend in the Trumbull County rivalry. Last year, the home team lost twice in what has been a heated rivalry.

“By heated, it’s not fistfights and all that,” Chad Kiser said. “It’s just really good basketball.”