News Photo by Jonny Zawacki Alcona’s Brittany Decker (50) prevents Fairview’s Jenna DeJarlais (22) from getting into the paint during the third quarter of a girls basketball game on Monday at Alcona High School.

LINCOLN — One of the strengths of the Alcona girls basketball team is its ability to control and score in the post.

The Tigers showcased that strength and earned a 35-31 victory over Fairview on Monday at Alcona High School.

“We thought we could get what we wanted out of the post tonight and I think we did. We had some good looks in there and our post players are strong and that is definitely the focal point of our team,” Alcona coach Mark Feldhiser said. “We knew it was going to be a close game against Fairview. They play tough defense and take their time on offense and I just told the girls to focus on winning every quarter and even thought it didn’t quite go that way, we won the most important quarter and I’m proud of the way the kids closed the game out.”

Unlike the last time these two teams met earlier in the season, this game was close the entire way. The Eagles did what they like to do early in limiting Alcona’s chances by slowing the game down and making the most of their chances early as they held a four point lead after the first quarter.

The Tigers began to put pressure on Fairview and went to their bread and butter: getting the ball down low to the two talented forwards in Brittany Decker and Taylor Livingston.

Alcona got off to a nice start in the second quarter, going on a 13-4 run led by Decker and Livingston who combined to score 10 of the team’s 13 second quarter points.

Fairview responded to the Tigers’ run, scoring the final six points of the half which ended with Tamara Oaks getting a shot to fall at the buzzer to give the Eagles a 22-21 halftime lead.

“We were trying to come up with the ways to score at the half. Alcona is quite a bit bigger than us and the size difference was wearing as the game went on,” Fairview coach Marc Winton said.

Coming out of the break, the Eagles struggled to find ways to score as they were held to just three points in the quarter, but only trailed by two heading into the fourth quarter.

The duo of Decker and Livingston proved to be too much in the final quarter and combined for seven of the eight points scored by Alcona in the quarter and the Eagles just could not put together much offense at all as they were held to just nine points in the second half.

“We had a chance and that’s what you hope for to have a chance at the end, but we just didn’t put points on the board and the third quarter hurt us,” Winton said. “Defensively I thought we played well and held a lot of their guards in check, but their size compared to ours is a huge difference and they played to their strengths. I thought we gave a good effort, but we just have to find ways to score.”

Decker led all scorers pouring in a game-high 17 points with all but one of those points coming from underneath the basket. Livingston collected 10 points as the two combined for all but eight of Alcona’s points.

“Winning close games like this can certainly help us going forward and just having that confidence knowing that late in a game you can pull one out is huge for us. We needed a game like this and I’m glad it was close,” Feldhiser said.

The Eagles were led by Andrea Ford who scored 10 points. Alyson Winton added six points and Jenna DeJarlais chipped in with five points in the losing effort.

Fairview falls to 8-3 overall on the year and will host the red hot Hillman Tigers on Thursday.

Alcona gets back to the .500 mark at 6-6 overall and will be back in action on Friday when it travels to Hale.

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ALCONA (35) — M. Grove, 0 1-2 1; T. Livingston, 4 2-5 10; J. Joyce, 1 0-0 2; M. Lane, 0 2-2 2; B. Schultz, 2 0-0 4; K. Elmer, 0 0-2 0; B. Decker, 8 1-4 17.

FAIRVIEW (31) — J. Winton, 1 0-0 2; T. Oaks, 2 0-0 4; A. Ford, 5 0-4 10; A. Winton, 3 0-0 6; J. DeJarlais, 2 1-6 5; W. Layman, 2 0-0 4.

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