Washington loses to Mt. Pleasant Panthers Friday

Whenever there is a rivalry game, the air is filled with excitement and each other?s fans are hoping their team wins.

That was the case for Washington Friday night as the Demons boys basketball team faced the Mt. Pleasant Panthers at home.

It was clear from the onset who the winner would be as Mt. Pleasant would start off strong in the first quarter putting up seven points before allowing the host team to get on the board.

After giving up four points to Washington, Mt. Pleasant answered by adding six more before letting Washington score four more points.

The Panthers would add an additional five points by the end of the quarter to have an 18-8 point lead.

Both teams answered each other?s points at the start of the second quarter, but Mt. Pleasant slowly started to build a lead after letting Washington add a total of 10 before ending the quarter with a 14-point ride ending the half up 45-18.

After returning to the court, Mt. Pleasant would pull ahead even further, putting up enough points to enforce the continuous clock rule with nearly five minutes left in the third. Washington would struggle to score the entire frame, only scoring 10 while the visiting Panthers added 22 more, putting the score at 67-28.

Washington was only allowed to score eight points in the fourth quarter while Mt. Pleasant dominated the scoring by adding another 19 to get the win 86-36.

One part of the game that Coach Collin Stark saw from Mt. Pleasant was giving up many points to the opponents. That is something he doesn?t like to see.

?There were a lot of breakdowns tonight. I thought that when Mt. Pleasant comes in, they will work hard and bring some energy.

?You will quickly see a point difference if you don?t match that intensity. We started the game well, then started to lose it from there.

?This is one of those things you didn?t expect to happen. I thought our guys were ready to play. There are some good things that happened. Hopefully this is an eye-opener that we still have some work to do.?

Even though the game ended in a loss, there were still positives taken away from the game.

?We kept competing and didn?t hang our heads too much. There were individual plays that we can take away. We didn?t foul as much, which is a huge positive.?

During the day today, the team is going to work on their defense.

?When you give up 86 points, you won?t win many games, especially when you only score 36. The only way to do that is to get your lunch pail and go to work.?

Leading the scoring for the Demons was Jack Redlinger with eight points. He also had four steals in the game. Jaivonn Willis scored six points, had four rebounds and had one steal.

Luke Turner scored five points, had two rebounds, one assist and one steal. Bryce Sinn also scored five points in the game. He had five rebounds and three steals.

Tanner Coleman scored four points and had one rebound. Dalton Myers scored two points, had one rebound and two assists.

Mason Rich scored two points, had one rebound, one assist and two steals. Cale Hobscheidt scored two points and had two rebounds. Jacob Van Osdol also scored two points in the game.

The Demons are 1-6 and next play tomorrow at home against West Liberty. The game starts at 7:45 p.m.