BY BUDDY TABLER

Special to the Tribune

LAKIN—Larned’s boys raced out to a 10-point first-quarter lead and roared past Lakin for a 71-56 non-conference basketball win.

Lakin played a full-court pressure defense and the Indians time-after-time pushed the ball through it and to the basket for layups.

Larned countered with a half-court trapping defense before dropping into their patented man-to-man defense. Larned converted 22 Lakin turnovers into easy points.

“We were really good at breaking down their press and attacking the basket tonight,” said Larned coach Jerrod Smith. “We got a lot of layups which improves our shooting percentage.”

Brayden Rupp led the Indians in scoring, totaling 27, many of them around the basket after some terrific passes from teammates. Larned’s Chance Sanger had a terrific game on defense and led the Indians in rebounding with 11 boards.

Defensive standout Mason Perez added 12 and Chance Sanger and Trent Fletcher contributed eight apiece.

 Larned converted 26 of 51 shots for 51 percent.

“We were really good defensively tonight, except for the second quarter”, added Smith. “Mason Perez did a heck of a job defensively on Henry Chou. When Mason was out of the game, Chou went off on us, but the rest of the game we were good.”

Larned (5-2) plays Lyons Tuesday.

Despite Larned’s fast start and behind Lakin’s Henry Chou’s 17 second-quarter points, the Broncs took a 30-29 halftime lead but Larned countered after halftime with 17 third-quarter points and had a 7-point advantage of 46-39 heading into the decisive fourth quarter.

Chou added 11 more points to his 17 in the second quarter to lead all scorers with 28. He was backed up by Dominic Daniels with 13.

Lakin (4-3) converted 17 of 33 field goals.