Southern
Sports & TravelSimpson suffered their second loss of the season last night as the third ranked Cougars fell on the road to sixth ranked Brookhaven 50-33. Brookhaven, coming off a narrow 48-46 loss to MRA, pulled away after a tight first quarter and controlled the game the remainder of the way in improving to 8-4 on the season.
Brookhaven junior Zack Smith led all scorers with 16 points while Will Hickman and Matthew Evans hit for 14 and 10 points respectively.
Simpson led just twice in the contest. Walt Prince’s 3-pointer from the wing gave Simpson a 5-4 advantage at the 5:51 mark of the first quarter but that would be the last lead for the Cougars.
Simpson closed the half with a Josh Hankins 15 footer with 27 seconds left to pull to within nine points at 26-17.
Hankins would get a driving lay-in to start the third quarter and get Simpson to within seven points at 26-19 but that was countered by a Peyton Hood 3-pointer from the corner to extend the margin back to double digits at 29-19 less than two minutes into the second half.
A
Matthew Evans assist to Travis Thornton gave Brookhaven their biggest lead at 34-21
with 3:08 remaining in the quarter. Simpson’s Tyler King closed the scoring in
the third quarter with a basket in the paint but the Cougars trailed 35-24
entering the fourth quarter.
A
Brookhaven 5-2 run to start the final quarter pushed the lead to 40-26 with
4:10 left in regulation and Brookhaven would convert on 6/7 free throws down
the stretch to take a 50-33 win.
Zack
Smith (Photo left) led all scorers with 16 points, Will Hickman added 14, Matthew Evans 10,
Travis Thornton 6 and Peyton Hood 3.
Walt
Prince paced Simpson (10-2) with 9 points and Josh Hankins added 8.
Next
up for Brookhaven is Oak Forest in Brookhaven on Thursday.
