Space created: Lexington beats Mansfield Senior, earns two-game lead in OCC standings

LEXINGTON — Right from the opening tip, it was obvious it was going to be Elijah Hudson's night.

He scored the very first basket during Lexington's dominating 83-56 win over Mansfield Senior on Saturday night that secured a two-game lead in the Ohio Cardinal Conference standings. He went on to score a career-high 26 points on 12-of-20 shooting while pulling down 12 rebounds with three assists and three blocked shots for one heck of an all-around performance.

He had just four points after one and 10 at the half before going off in the third quarter with 11 points in the frame before ending with six in the fourth.

GIRLS BASKETBALL: Zoned in: Tygers overcome stingy Lexington zone, remain perfect in OCC play

"The ball was just going in," Hudson said. "To start the game, I shot a double-hitched 3 that didn't feel very good, but in warm-ups, the shot felt better than other days so I just kept shooting, and it worked out in the end."

It worked out extremely well in the end as the Minutemen (15-1, 9-0) rode the hot hand of Hudson to a 27-point victory over their cross county rival. And while Hudson played well offensively, he played even more inspired defensively, and Lexington coach Scott Hamilton recognized that.

"He did a nice job tonight playing under control," Hamilton said. "Defensively, he was a huge factor with his blocks and contesting shots. A lot of the drives they had, when they got to the rim, he was there to alter the shot. Offensively, he got in his rhythm and that was probably his best all-around game and what a night to have it against the No. 2 team in the conference at home against a rival like Mansfield Senior."

The Minutemen held Mansfield Senior to just five points in the second quarter to take a 32-17 lead into halftime after a 16-12 advantage after the first. They held the Tygers to just eight points in the paint through the first half and never gave them a clean look at the basket when they got in the lane. Lex proceeded to allow just 34 points in the paint and out-rebound the Tygers by 21 (48-27) for the game. Lex sophomore Brayden Fogle led everyone with 13 boards while Joe Caudill had eight.

"We talked about that a lot this week because we knew they were playing tougher basketball over the last nine games," Hamilton said. "They were at full strength tonight, and our focus was that we just had to be tougher than them. We have to out-rebound them, out-work them and show them that we want it more than they did. We got on the floor and showed our toughness."

Seven Allen helped Hudson with the offensive scoring with 14 points while also handing out eight assists. Caudill and Dantrell Hughes had eight points apiece while Fogle had six points to go with his 13 rebounds and five assists.

The second quarter was the difference maker as the 11-point advantage in the frame allowed Lex to put it in cruise control for the rest of the evening.

"We gave up six points in the first two minutes of the third," Hamilton said with a laugh. "When you get to this point of the season, you know who the scorers are and who the shooters are and we did a great job of identifying that in the second quarter. We came out in the third and they made a nice run to start, but we came down and stopped the bleeding and next thing you know, we were up 20."

Mansfield Senior (10-3, 7-2) saw a nine-game winning streak snapped on Saturday night. Their last loss was to Lexington back on Dec. 12 by 25.

"We didn't do anything tonight that we worked all week on," Mansfield Senior assistant coach Nathon Loney said. "We talked about that as coaches in the locker room and that is the saddest part of the night that everything we worked on all week just didn't translate. It was disappointing just because of that."

Over the last nine games, Mansfield Senior played the style that made it the No. 5 winningest program in Ohio high school basketball history. It calls it, 'Tyger basketball' and it was exactly what Lexington did to the Tygers on Saturday.

"We were doing what Lexington did to us tonight," Loney said. "We beat teams with transition basketball and played fast offensively by forcing turnovers on defense with steals and turned that into offense. We didn't do that tonight. Our biggest factor was to make them be a half-court team and we didn't do that."

Loney had to give credit to Hudson for his big performance that set the tone from the jump.

"He is a very good player and a tough matchup," Loney said. "He is very capable of doing that night in and night out especially if he gets hot. If you would have told me he was going to be the big difference maker for them tonight, I wouldn't have been surprised because he is that kid who can do that for them."

Kyevi Roane led all scorers with 27 points and DJ Corbin added nine for the Tygers but no other player scored more than seven. A lot of that was a credit to the defensive effort by the Minutemen who held the Tygers to 34.8% shooting for the game and 25.3% from the foul line. Nothing came easy.

"We heard they wanted it more than us and they were going to come in here and push us around, but we made sure that didn't happen," Hudson said. "All throughout practice this week, we made it an emphasis to make sure we protected the paint and we did that really well."

The Lexington win came on the heels of its first loss of the season last Sunday to Division I Gahanna Lincoln. A 27-point win over the Tygers was a heck of a way to put that loss in the rearview mirror.

"We played a very good team and we played very well, well enough to win," Hamilton said. "We just couldn't finish it out. The guys would have liked to get on the floor a little sooner to get that one behind them, but tonight, they were chomping at the bit to get back on the floor. It was good to come back and get a win."

Lexington's magic number for an outright Ohio Cardinal Conference title is down to 4 and it will try to cut it to 3 on Tuesday at Madison. Mansfield Senior hosts Mount Vernon on the same evening with sights set on remaining in the hunt as long as they can.

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This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Lexington Minutemen beat Mansfield Senior Tygers in Ohio Cardinal Conference basketball