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LAUREL - The Laurel-Concord-Coleridge Bears split a pair of games this past week with a Greater Northeast Activities Conference win over Hartington-Newcastle, 56-43 on Jan. 21 and an 80-30 loss to Battle Creek on Jan. 23.
A tough shooting night and a hot opponent are recipes for disaster and that’s exactly what happened to the Bears against the Braves in the big loss.
Battle Creek jumped to a 23-9 lead after the first stanza and really never looked back, outscoring LCC in every frame to come away with the surprisingly easy win.
Eli Haisch led what little offense the Bears had with nine points, Gibson Roberts added seven and Caleb Erwin chipped in four.
Haisch and Erwin each grabbed four rebounds, Cade Johnson recorded three.
The night was much better Jan.21 when the Wildcats came to town.
LCC looked as if it might run away from HNS in the early going.
The Bears sprinted to a 7-0 lead to open the game on a runner by Johnson in the paint, a three from the left side of the court Haisch and another Johnson bucket inside where he scored and was fouled.
Johnson didn’t complete the traditional 3-point play, but his team was up by the 7-0 start.
The Wildcats would get back to within one with 3:41 still left in the first, but a Roberts long ball pushed the advantage back up to four.
When the dust settled on the opening eight minutes, the Bears were up 20-17.
Roberts, who would finish with a game-high 26 points, canned a drive to the hoop to open the second quarter then got a big block on an HNS layup at the other end of the floor .
After a Wildcat basket, Roberts drove the paint again and scored then Erwin converted 1-of-2 charity tosses and the lead was back up to six, 25-19 just over midway through the second frame.
The advantage would dwindle to a bucket, but Roberts wasn’t done with the first half.
Tanner Thompson would score for the Bears to make it 27-23 before Roberts hit another runner in the paint then finished the half with another trifecta to send the teams to the locker room with LCC in front, 32-23.
Laurel-Concord-Coleridge added six points to the lead in the third then coasted to the win in the fourth by the 13-point margin.
Haisch added 12 to Roberts 26, he scored his dozen behind the arc. Johnson would finish with eight and he hauled down 13 rebounds, Connor Korth pulled down 10 missed shots.
The Bears were set to welcome Lutheran High Northeast to LCC Tuesday before a Thursday trip to Wakefield. LCC will open action in the Greater Northeast Activities Conference Tournament Feb. 3.
BC (9-8) 23 18 21 18— 80 LCC (6-10) 9 7 3 11 — 30
LCC: Caleb Erwin 1-7 2-2 4; Paxton Hoeppner 1-1 0-0 2; Talon Carson 1-4 0-0 3; Drey Puppe 0-5 1-2 1; Carter Korth 0-3 0-0 0; Kyle Rasmussen 0-2 0-0 0; Gibson Roberts 3-12 0-0 7; Eli Haisch 3-8 0-0 9; Connor Korth 0-1 0-0 0; Tanner Thompson 0-4 1-2 1; Cade Johnson 0-6 3-4 3. H-N (6-9) 17 6 10 10 — 43 LCC (6-10) 20 12 16 8 — 56 LCC: Erwin 2-8 2-4 6; Puppe 0-1 0-0 0; Ca. Korth 1-5 0-0 2; Roberts 10-20 4-4 26; Haisch 4-7 0-0 12; Co. Korth 0-4 0-0 0; Thompson 1-1 0-0 2; Johnson 3-9 1-3 8.
