On Tues., Jan. 26, the Tigers hosted the Lawrence Central Bears, the seventh highest ranked team in the state of Indiana.

The first quarter was full of action, with two turnovers forced by senior forward Lance Dollison to start off the game. Defense from both sides caused a rather low-scoring opening quarter, with the Tigers leading 15-9.

That trend continued in the second quarter, but more for Lawrence Central as they outscored the Tigers 14-12.

But still, FHS led 27-23 at halftime.

“We had a game plan. We’ve worked on it every week, everyday we’ve worked on it. We’ve been working on it even when we’re playing other teams,” freshman guard Willie Jackson said.

Dollison led the Tigers with 10 points. Kyle Guy, a senior shooting guard from Lawrence Central, had seven. Guy has committed to the University of Virginia and is a McDonald’s All-American.

The Tigers stretched their lead back out to seven in the third quarter, heading into the final quarter with a 45-38 lead.

Lawrence Central brought the game all the way back to a tie late in the fourth quarter. LC had the chance to tie the game back up with less than 20 seconds remaining, but missed one free throw. Senior guard Andre Small went to the line with 16.3 seconds left and extending their one-point lead to three points.

The Bears had a couple shots in the final seconds of the game to try and tie the game and send it to overtime, but those attempts fell short. FHS won, 64-61.

With the scoring ability of Guy, the Tigers played a zone defense. Jackson, who started the year off on junior varsity and is now in the varsity starting lineup, said the team’s active hands and solid rotations in the zone caused Lawrence Central’s offense some trouble.

“We hit them with something different that no other team has hit them [with] besides one. We’ve been working on it with other teams, playing zone. We had better defenders that could defend them,” Jackson said.

The Tigers never trailed in this game. Dollison led with 20 points, and senior center Cam Wolter posted 18 points and nine rebounds.

Head coach Joe Leonard captured his 99th victory with this win and will go for his 100th vs. Lawrence North (away) on Sat., Jan. 30. The Tigers have now won four straight and five of six games.