TOPSHAM

Over the final three quarters of Friday night’s crossover battle between boys high school basketball teams Freeport and Mt. Ararat, the host Eagles made run after run at the Falcons.

A dozen times, Mt. Ararat had the ball, with the chance to either tie or take the lead. Each time, Freeport held on, then went on a run to extend its advantage.

In the end, the Falcons prevailed, 67-60, giving Freeport a 6-3 mark heading into Tuesday’s home date with Morse (5:30 p.m.).

On the other side, Jeff Hogan’s Eagles fell to 3-8, and for another night the first-year coach wondered aloud what it was going to take for his team to put together a complete 32- minute effort.

“We are in it every game, but for some reason we just can’t get over the hump,” said Hogan, whose Eagles are off until this upcoming Friday when they head to Lincoln Academy (6:30 p.m.). “I don’t know what I have to do. If we had tied it, we would have won the game as the whole momentum of the game would have changed.”

It was another slow start for Mt. Ararat to overcome, as Freeport darted out to a 15-5 lead in the opening quarter as Eriksen Shea scored six points and Toby Holt picked up five.

“We have had two games this year where we started out on top. The rest we have had to battle back from 10, 12, 15 points behind. It is tough,” Hogan said.

After an Eagles timeout, Mt. Ararat closed the opening frame with an 8-2 run, getting to 17-13 through eight minutes. Greg Malin hit a pair of 3- pointers in the opening quarter, while Jared Balser picked up four inside points.

Freeport opened a 22-13 edge early in the second quarter before the teams went back and forth over the next five minutes. Peter Lavan scored inside to get the Eagles to 22-18, but Kaleb Barrett answered with a long trey. Tanner Greenleaf hit from long range for Mt. Ararat, and after Colby Wagner put home his own miss for the Falcons, Greenleaf again nailed a trey to make for a 27-24 contest.

Trailing by three, Kyle Brennan scored inside while being fouled to get the Eagles to 29-28 with 51 seconds remaining until halftime. Again, Freeport found a quick spurt, closing the half on a 4-0 run for a 33-28 lead.

“Each time they thought they were going to catch us we hit that big shot,” said Freeport coach Bill Ridge. “We have seen that, and we have those guys who hit that big shot when we are trying to protect the lead. That is big.”

More runs

The game remained close in the third quarter before an 8-0 Freeport spurt made a one-point game into a 48-39 lead for the visitors.

“We are a momentum team, and we run on the fast break. That is our game,” said Freeport senior guard Ethan Sclar, who remembers his freshman year when the Freeport boys basketball program struggled to earn a win. “This year has been a blast compared to freshman year. It really shows how hard we have worked. We took a lot of positives in the game against Greely (a 64-50 loss on Thursday), and we were able to bring that into here tonight.”

“Ethan has been through the ringer and has come a long way,” Ridge said. “Coaches around the conference say how much stronger he is and how far he has come in four years. The younger guys, we laugh about it because they don’t know any better. Having some success is all that they know. Even last night in a loss, it has been fun this year.”

Mt. Ararat refused to go away, using a 5-0 run to close to 48-44 before Sclar closed the quarter with his second trey for a 51-44 Freeport lead heading to the fourth.

Back to back treys by Shea opened up a 56-47 Freeport lead early in the quarter. Once again back came the Eagles. Ryan Mello fought inside for two points, then Will Kavanaugh hit a pair of free throws to get Mt. Ararat to 56- 51 with 6:19 remaining. Colby Wagner’s steal and putback upped Freeport’s lead back to seven, but Malin, who had a game-high 20 points, nailed his sixth 3-pointer of the contest to move the Eagles to 58-54.

Moments later, Malin hit from just inside the arc to get the Eagles within two points, and a steal gave Mt. Ararat a chance to tie or go ahead.

But after a turnover, Barrett found open space and scored from long distance, and Shea, who led Freeport with 19 points, swished a 3-pointer for a 64-56 Falcons edge with 2:31 left.

“It would have been the world to catch them. It is tough,” said Malin. “We have the potential to be a very impressive team. We score, we can pass and we can play good defense when we try. It just didn’t work out.”

Freeport had trouble closing the game out, finishing 6-of-16 from the free-throw line, including 3-of-7 in the fourth quarter.

“We had some of our better foul shooters at the line and they just weren’t falling,” said Ridge. “The second game of back to backs, we had starters banged up from last night and (Caleb) Salter played more minutes tonight than he had all year. This was a good team win.”

Freeport shot 50 percent (27- of-54) from the field, while Mt. Ararat made 23-of-59 (38 percent) from the floor and 5-of-10 at the charity stripe.

Greenleaf and Balser each scored eight points for the Eagles, while Mello picked up six, and Kavanaugh and Michael Rogers five each. Balser had 11 rebounds, while Austin Damon pulled down seven caroms. Guard Max Spelke dished out eight assists, with Greenleaf finishing with five assists and three steals.

Holt chipped in 13 points for Freeport, Barrett had 12, with Sclar finishing with eight, and Nate Thomas and Wagner six each. Barrett had four steals and two assists, with Salter and Wagner dishing out three helpers each. Thomas led Freeport with six rebounds, while Shea picked up five rebounds, five steals and three assists.