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Belpre boys beat Eastern

Golden Eagles led in scoring by Conner Baker’s 19 points

Belpre’s Dylan Cox defends Eastern’s Jayce Bullington during a play in the Golden Eagles’ 62-41 win over the visiting Eagles Friday night in Belpre. Photo by Josh Hughes

BELPRE — Connor Baker led all scorers with 19, as the Belpre Golden Eagles bested Eastern, 62-41 on Friday night from Belpre. In what head coach Tyler Leasure called his team’s “most complete game” of the season, the Golden Eagles (2-3) had to call on a few junior varsity players to fill out the remainder of the night’s roster. The team did not miss a beat, as a 13-9 lead after the opening eight minutes of play soon turned into a hole too big for the visiting Eagles to overcome.

A 17-7 run created the space needed in the second quarter for BHS to run away with a double digit lead, as Leasure praised his team’s physical play, en route to snapping a 3-game losing skid.

“We just talked about how the last three games we’ve played, we weren’t as physical as the other team,” he said. “On our end, we folded a little bit and weren’t as physical as we should have been.

“That’s what we focused on all week was competing and being as physical as we could. I think the guys really took that to heart.”

Baker found comfort at point guard, as he filled in for Evan Wells. Cody Daugherty was also out for the Birds, as well as Brady Shriver. With all those players gone due to a combination of what Leasure called “injury or illness,” the rest of the squad picked up the slack. Jordan Harrington was the next-highest scorer for Belpre, with 10. His pressure forced Eastern into mistakes on its end of the floor, as Brady Watson’s 17 points weren’t enough to keep his team competitive. Dylan Cox dominated on the glass, picking up nine points and nine boards against the smaller Eastern players on the inside. While Baker led the way with five 3-pointers, Tucker Liston netted a pair of triples to help the cause. Ashton Yeater and Jacob Smeeks each buried one from distance, as Smeeks brought in seven points on the night following his time in the junior varsity game. The experience earned by the likes of Smeeks and Nick Lambert was needed, and Leasure spoke of how important that ended up being.

“We just continue to try and get better every day, and I know it’s a cliche, but our guys did a nice job of filling their roles and doing what their supposed to do. We want to continue to grow and get better as the season goes. We’re missing a lot of guys, as far as injury and sickness go. We looked at our roster and tried to bring up a couple guys we really thought would help out the team, and these young guys who were on the floor really made a big impact for us. We’re really happy about that. Hopefully, that continues in the future.”

Belpre shifts its attention to a 6 p.m. Saturday home contest when Portsmouth-Clay comes to town. It’s an opportunity for the Golden Eagles to make it back to .500, and for Baker, he was excited with what he saw out of the team in this 21-point victory.

“That’s where I like playing. We had some guys out, so we had to work with what we had,” Baker said of his time playing at PG. “It was definitely our best defensive game of the year, and offensively, we played really well. We slowed down a bit in the second half with having a big lead. We didn’t want to rush, because we already had a bunch of injuries. It was definitely our most complete game. It was great to see those young guys out there. I don’t think Nick has had varsity experience in his life, and I don’t think Smeeks has had very much. It was nice to see him get some buckets, because we’re going to need him.”

Contact Josh Hughes at jhughes@newsandsentinel.com

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