News Photo by Jonny Zawacki Alpena’s Bruz Copping (12) soars to the basket for layup while being fouled by Traverse City Central defender Noah Norton during the fourth quarter of a Big North Conference boys basketball game on Friday at Alpena High School.

Getting a victory on your home court is always important, but defeating your conference rival only makes the win that much sweeter and that’s exactly what the Alpena boys basketball team did on Friday as the Wildcats finished strong to beat Big North Conference foe Traverse City Central, 60-51.

“I thought it was a huge bounce back tonight from the disappointment on Wednesday. It was such a short time to flip back and play a rival game and it was huge to get a win,” Alpena coach John Pintar said. “We really struggled when we played them over there at the beginning of the month and I think we’ve made leaps and bounds as a team since that time and these past two games against teams who beat us pretty soundly show that. We’re making progress and I’m very pleased with the effort from the entire team tonight.”

The Wildcats opened the game firing from beyond the three-point line and connected on three early triples as they opened up an 11-5 lead midway through the first.

Alpena’s lead didn’t last long as the Trojans close out the first quarter scoring 11 of the last 12 points to take grab a 16-12 lead after one quarter.

“We have not been a great three point shooting team and maybe we are a little better than what our percentages show, but you start settling for that too much it makes it too easy for the defense. We may have gotten a little carried away there early,” Pintar said.

Despite going a bit cold after starting the game so well, Alpena found its rhythm late in the second quarter as Cam DeCaire had it going early, scoring 16 of his 23 points in the first half, including the Wildcats first 10 points in the second quarter.

After trailing 21-16 midway through the second, Alpena closed the half on a 15-3 run which ended with Aidan Goike banking in a deep three as the buzzer went off to give the Wildcats a seven point halftime lead.

Alpena came out in the second half scoring eight unanswered points after the Trojans hit a three to open up a 12 point lead which was the largest of the night.

Again the lead didn’t last long as the Wildcats got sloppy and Traverse City capitalized going on a 13-0 run to take a 40-39 lead late in the third quarter, but Alpena connected on two shots in the finals seconds to take a 43-42 lead into the fourth quarter.

The final quarter of play was controlled by the home team as the Wildcats dominated the paint and unlike the opening quarter, scored all of there fourth quarter points from inside the three point line, many of which came under the basket as they made free throws down the stretch to close out what was another closely contested game.

“We’ve talked about the lessons learned from these close games. In previous games we made some mistakes and didn’t make shots when we needed to, but tonight we converted and some guys stepped up and we were able to pull away late,” Pintar said. “We’ve been playing a lot better basketball and it was a good win against a conference rival.”

DeCaire led all scorers with 23 in the Wildcats victory. Chris Derocher added 12 points and Logan Guthrie chipped in with 10 points.

Traverse City was led by Fitz Doud who scored 22 points. Jordan Vicent added eight points and both Noah Norton and Tobin Schwannecke chipped in with seven points apiece.

Alpena improves to 5-7 overall on the year and is now 2-3 in conference play. The Wildcats will play the first of what will be five consecutive road games on Monday when they travel to Gaylord.

“It’s going to be tough. We have played great at home, but now we have to go to other teams places and I think we’re more ready for it now than we were earlier,” Pintar said. “I think our guys are starting to figure it out and they are a fun group to watch grow and develop.”

It was a clean sweep as the Alpena JV and freshman team also earned victories over Traverse City.

The JV team won 49-45 and was led by Kayden Wisniewski who scored 21 points and Haydn Goebel and Aden Smith each added seven points apiece.

The freshman team won by a final of 64-41.

Kelly Stark led the Wildcats with 27 points. Jaydan Duncan added 10 points and Dean Kowalewsky chipped in with eight points.

——

ALPENA (60) — L. Pinger, 2 1-2 5; A. Goike, 1 0-0 3; B. Copping, 3 0-1 6; C. DeCaire, 6 8-9 23; C. Derocher, 5 1-4 12; L. Guthrie, 4 2-3 10.

TRAVERSE CITY (51) — F. Doud, 9 0-0 22; N. Norton, 3 0-4 7; T. Schwannecke, 3 1-1 7; P. Briggs, 1 0-0 3; J. Vicent, 3 0-0 8; B. McCrary, 1 0-0 2; B. Sherwin, 0 2-2 2.

Jonny Zawacki can be reached via email at jzawacki@thealpenanews.com or by phone at 358-5690.