Zane Trace edges Fairfield Christian, 46-43

LANCASTER — The mark of a great player is making his teammates around him better, and that was certainly the case for Zane Trace’s Pierce Mowery on Saturday night.

Mowery scored all 13 of the Pioneers’ points in the first quarter and finished with 17 at halftime against Fairfield Christian Academy. The Knights’ defense clamped down on him in the second half, holding him scoreless, but did other things to help his team. He had four rebounds and four assists in the fourth quarter alone.

With so much attention paid to Mowery, it enabled other players to get easy looks, especially in the fourth quarter. That proved to be the difference as visiting Zane Trace held on for a thrilling 46-43 nonconference victory over the Knights.

“He draws a lot of attention,” Zane Trace coach Allen Koker said. “They were double-teaming and that opened up things for some of our other players. They did a really good job of catching the pass and when we were getting back guts, we were finishing.

“(Pierce) is a very unselfish player, and yes, we need him to score, but he just wants to win and that is what is so great about him. When they are double-teaming him, he did a great job of finding the open man.”

The game was tight from start to finish, and with the Knights (13-6) leading 38-37 with 3:40 left, Mowery, who also had nine rebounds and six assists, found Alex Wolff on three consecutive possessions. Wolfe hit a 3-pointer, made a pair of free throws after he was fouled inside and scored on a backdoor play. That gave the Pioneers a 42-38 with only 1:25 left.

The Knights’ Landon Conley hit a 3 to cut the deficit to 44-43, and after Zane Trace (13-7) missed a shot, Fairfield Christian had the ball with 28 seconds left. After they called two timeouts to set up a play, the Knights missed, Mowery grabbed the rebound and passed a head to Joel Dunkle for a layup that sealed it.

“We basically chased (Mowery) and we got hurt on the backside a couple of times,” Fairfield Christian coach Roger Hooper said. “We just didn’t do a good job talking, but we had a chance at the end. We set up a play and we didn’t run it. We had a mismatch and we didn’t run it and that was it.

Zane Trace took a 13-12 lead in the first quarter as Mowery made three 3s. The Knights were able to take a 23-20 halftime lead as four different players scored. The Pioneers grabbed the lead back heading into the fourth quarter by finishing on a 7-2 run that gave them a 31-29 advantage.

Dunkle finished with 11 points for the Pioneers and Wolff added nine.

Isaac Naayers led the Knights with 10 points and eight rebounds, and Andrew Gerken added nine points.

The Knights only made 18-of-50 shots and was just 3-for-18 from 3-point range.

“We didn’t shoot it very well,” Hooper said. “We are really a pretty good 3-point shooting team but we just couldn’t make one. We also never got into our transition game, but Zane Trace played hard and they got back, so give them credit.”

twilson@lancastereaglegazette.com

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Twitter: @twil2323

Stat Book

Zane Trace 13-7-11-15 — 46

Fairfield Christian 12-11-6-14 — 43

Zane Trace: Dunkle 4 3-4 11, Wolfe 2 2-2 9, Mowry 5 4-5 17, Beam 1 0-0 2, T. Rittenhouse 1 0-0 3, Pillow 2 0-0 4. 16-40 FG, 9-11 FT, 5 3pt. (Mowry 3, Wolfe, Rittenhouse), 31 rebounds (Mowry 9), 13 turnovers, 11 Assists (Mowry 6).

Fairfield Christian: E. Conley 1 0-1 2, Thompson 1 0-0 3, Collins 1 0-0 3, L. Conley 2 1-2 6, Naayers 4 2-3 10, Stevens 3 0-0 6, Gerken 4 1-1 9, Kumler 2 0-0 4. 18-50 FG, 4-7 FT, 3 3pt. (E. Conley, Thompson, Collins), 28 rebounds (Naayers 8), 11 turnovers, 10 Assists (L. Conley 4).