Western Boone Jr. - Sr. High School

CRAWFORDSVILLE ­—Western Boone boys basketball saw their first action in three weeks Friday night when they opened up play in the 17th annual Boys Sugar Creek Classic at Crawfordsville. The Stars took on the host Athenians and jumped out to an early 12-4 lead thanks to a pair of made threes by Gavin Hawkins. WeBo led 12-9 after a quarter and saw Crawfordsville go on an 18-4 run to gain the lead and ultimately take a 27-21 lead into halftime. WeBo got back in the game using an 8-0 run to even the score at the 3:05 mark and trailed by just three entering the final quarter but weren’t able to do enough in the final eight minutes as Crawfordsville defeated the Stars 56-49. WeBo struggled to contain Crawfordsville junior Alec Saidian who led all scorers with 26 points on 11-17 from the floor. “It really wasn’t anything that they were running for him (Saidian),” Stars coach Dustin Oakley said. “Crawfordsville just found him in the open spots down low but it was frustrating that we lost their leading scorer and rebounder countless times. That was disappointing to see since we spent a lot of time going over how to guard him in our scouting report. He certainly made us pay with those 26 points.” Another issue for Western Boone (2-7) in the loss was their inability to hit shots from the foul line. WeBo shot a very poor 4-17 (23.5%) from the charity stripe in the loss. That of all things was what frustrated Oakley the most. “That’s just miserable shooting that poorly from the line,” Stars coach Dustin Oakley said. “It’s something that happens usually just once or twice in a season but it sucks that it happened tonight. Our shot selection in the fourth quarter wasn’t as good as it needed to be either. I was proud of how some of the other guys stepped up with how tightly they were guarding Marcus (Fortner). Gavin and Tristyn (Faulk) both played well and Quinn Westerfeld came alive a little bit in the second half. We did some good things but have to put it all together for a full 32.” Western Boone was led in scoring by both Tristyn Faulk’s 11. Marcus Fortner and Hawkins who ended with 10 points. Quinn Westerfield and Luke Adkins both added six, Philip Talbott four and Drew Gott two. The Stars for the game shot 20-49 (40.8%) from the floor, 5-15 (33.3%) from three to go along with that not so nice number of 4-17 (23.5%) from the line. They grabbed 36 rebounds and turned the ball over 10 times. In the win Crawfordsville (5-4) shot 22-47 (47%) from the field, but just 3-13 (23%) from three. The Athenians were 11-19 (58%) from the free throw line and grabbed 31 rebound while turning it over seven times. WeBo will play North Montgomery in Saturday’s consolation game which will get started at 5 p.m. Oakley sees this as a chance for his team to get back in the win column and forget about the Friday night loss. “We really hurt ourselves with missed opportunities but we I’m interested in seeing how we respond versus North tomorrow,” he said. “We need a win and we’ll see what we can do to just that.” Will Willems is the Sports Editor of the Lebanon Reporter. Follow him on Twitter @Will_Willems.