By RAY BENTON
Leader sports editor
The Jacksonville Lighthouse Charter Wolves won its first regular-season basketball game on Friday, going on the road to defeat Pangburn 95-80 in its first game as an Arkansas High School Activities Association sanctioned team.
The Wolves struggled with the talented and tall Tigers for a while, but began to pull away in the second quarter when outside shots started to fall and Pangburn made no adjustments.
Lighthouse hit 13 of 30 3-point attempts, shooting over Pangburn’s 2-3-zone defense.
“He never came out of that zone even when we started hitting,” said JLCS coach Kelvin Parker. “So I said, OK. If you’re going to stay back, we’re just going to keep firing. We fired up a lot.”
Pangburn (2-2) led 24-23 at the end of a fast-paced first quarter. Tiger center Nick Lukas hit a bucket at the buzzer to give the home team the lead, but the Wolves outscored them 50-30 in the second and third periods. They took a 46-39 lead into intermission, and a defensive adjustment at halftime helped them to take command of the game in the third.
“We switched some things up to try to stop their big kid in the middle,” Parker said. “He (Lukas) was the one hurting us offensively. He had 18 points in the first half, but he didn’t score at all in the third quarter and we got out on them pretty good.”
Senior Zack Bobo led JLCS with 22 points while freshman Gerald Doakes added 20 and Davonte Davis 16. Lukas led Pangburn with 23.
Lighthouse and Pangburn are in the same district and will play in the same postseason conference tournament, but Friday’s game was not a conference matchup because of the blended regular-season leagues the AHSAA has put together for at least this season and next.
“That’s why I scheduled them and a few others,” Parker said. “We only have one team we play in our regular season conference games that’s going to be in our postseason conference tournament. It doesn’t make any sense to me, but I wanted a chance to see as many as I could before going into that, so I scheduled them as nonconference games. It benefits them, too.”
The Lady Wolves were not as successful, falling 68-24 to the Pangburn. Dathonia Powell led JLCS (0-1) with 15 points. Tylar Vernon of Pangburn led all scorers with 17.
Hannah Bourgeois added 13 and Macie Hopkins 12 for the Lady Tigers (2-2).
Lighthouse boys and girls played Academic Charter Plus at Oak Grove last night after Leader deadlines. They will travel to Nevada on Friday.
