South splits pair of weekend games

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WEST ALEXANDRIA — Twin Valley South split a pair of games last week, starting out with a back-and-forth victory over Mississinawa Valley before falling to non-conference foe Brookville to close out the week.

On Friday, Jan. 22, the Panthers made the trip to Mississinawa, where the two teams traded leads throughout the contest before South came away with a 44-42 victory.

South opened up the game with an 11-7 lead and took a close 18-17 lead into the break. But the Blackhawks made a run to close out the third and went into the fourth holding a eight-point lead.

The Panthers opened up the final frame with a 14-1 run-through but Mississinawa took a one-point lead with under a minute remaining.

South responded, scoring off an inbound play that led to an open layup by Jacob Bassler with 14 seconds left, allowing South to eventually walk away with the two-point win.

“I thought we played outstanding on defense,” said head coach Tony Augspurger.

They also had a big game from Jacob Bassler, who posted a game high 25 points for the Panthers. Mike Meyers also added 11 points while JJ Utz chipped in five points.

South then turned around, hitting the road again, with a game at Brookville on Saturday, Jan. 23, losing 67-55 to the Blue Devils.

“This was the second game this year where I felt we did not match the energy coming out to start the game that the team we were playing against had,” said Augspurger. “They played with a sense of desperation in terms of their intensity and they just shot the lights out in the first quarter.”

Brookville posted 22 points to South’s 10 in the first quarter, jumping out to a big lead. The Panthers slowly chipped away at the lead, coming within five at one point, but could never recover.

“We got into a hole. I thought we fought, scrapped, battled; we made runs in the second, third and fourth quarter but we could never get it close,” said Augspurger.

Bassler led South once again with 22 points while Utz added 15. Winston Crosier chipped in eight while Mike Meyers posted five for the Panthers.

South hosted Franklin Monroe on Tuesday, Jan. 26 and is scheduled to travel to Bradford on Friday, Jan. 29 for a 6:30 p.m. tip-off.

By Jeremy Erskine

[email protected]

Reach Jeremy at 937-683-4061 or on Twitter @jerskine_RH.

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