SYRACUSE – Northridge hit eight three-pointers in the first half, and went on to a convincing 67-51 win over Wawasee in a Northern Lakes Conference boys basketball game Thursday night at the Hardwood Tepee. Warrior coach Jon Everingham said his team planned to slow down senior Luke Morrison, averaging 21 points a game, and junior Connor Utley, scoring nearly 11 points a game, with a triangle-and-two defense. That left Nick Yoder, who scored 17 in Thursday’s game, and Jackson Erekson, who came in to the game averaging six points a game but hit five three-pointers in the first half. The red-hot long-distance shooting gave the Raiders a 38-21 halftime lead. “We tried to confuse them a little bit with some different looks in terms of defense, start out in triangle and two, and force some other guys to beat us than Utley and Morrison,” Everingham said. “Morrison is a very, very good player. We really held him down in the first half. “But good teams have other players that can step up. We rolled the dice a little bit to get some other guys to beat us, and that’s exactly what they did.” Erekson finished with 16 points, Utley had 13 and Morrison 12. Thursday marked the return of Trevon Coleman to the Wawasee lineup, and the senior responded with a team-high 14 points. But starting guard Tyler Smith saw only limited action due to illness. “We’re trying to piece some things together, and every coach is going to be singin’ the blues like that at some point during the season. It’s unfortunate that for us, it’s coming right now,” Everingham said. Jacob Hand came off the bench to score 13 points for Wawasee, and Bennett Hoffert added 12 before fouling out late. The loss was the 41st-straight in NLC?play for Wawasee, and the Warriors have an eight-day break before getting one last shot at stopping the streak at Goshen (9-8 overall, 1-5 NLC) on Feb. 10. Everingham said he and his players, in spite of a 5-11 overall mark and 10 losses in its their 11 games, remain steadfast in their belief in each other. “We have not gone into one game this year where we really felt like we were not going to win. That is a huge jump from where these guys were,” he said. “They continue to believe that we are going to win. Sometimes the belief that you can do something is half the battle. “We believe we can win. I believe in our guys and I believe we can win. It’s just a matter of, No. 1, getting healthy, a little bit of rest, then starting to do some good things a little more consistently, including defense.” Notes – Wawasee added former head coach Phil Mishler to its ring of honor before the game. He is the winningest coach in program history (168-126), and the Warriors won three sectional titles and the 2005 regional under Mishler.
