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Indians breeze to win

Lehighton coach Rich Oertner was looking for a spark.

He got a raging inferno.Looking to shake things up after a rough stretch of games, Oertner made a couple of lineup changes on Friday night against Blue Mountain.The Indians responded with one of their most impressive performances of the season as they routed the Blue Eagles, 74-58, in Schuylkill League action."We had lost five of our last seven games and I thought we were becoming a little complacent," said Oertner. "We had a couple of guys in Tanner (Zwetolitz) and Hunter (Greene) who had been practicing well and playing well off the bench. I thought they deserved a chance, so I gave them starts tonight."The move didn't pay immediate dividends as Lehighton fell behind 12-5 midway through the first quarter. But eventually the Indians' new rotation began to pay off.Lehighton rallied to take a 15-14 lead after one quarter and never trailed the rest of the way."Tanner and Hunter might have been a little nervous early, but their second and third times through our rotation they played very well," said Oertner. "We got good performances up and down the line-up."I was especially happy with how our kids played in their new roles. In addition to the new starters, Jordan (Knappenberger) and Tyler (Williams) both had nice games coming off the bench for the first time."Lehighton (12-7, 5-6) began to take control of the game late in the second quarter as a three-point play by Nick Chambers and a three-point shot by Tyler Crum extended the Indian advantage to 36-29 at the break. Crum drilled three triples and had 11 points in the quarter for Lehighton.Any hope Blue Mountain (11-8, 7-5) had of getting back in the game was quickly extinguished as Lehighton opened the third quarter with a 16-4 run to make it 52-33. Seven different Indians had field goals during the spurt."We went with a seven-man rotation tonight and tried to keep everyone fresh by moving people in and out fairly often," said Oertner. "I thought it really helped us offensively."The Lehighton lead was 61-38 after three quarters as Knappenberger had nine points in the period."We didn't defend the three-point line at all, we got dominated on the boards, and we turned the ball over way too much," said Blue Mountain coach Dustin Werdt. "I guess what I'm saying is there wasn't any one thing that was the difference tonight. It was quite a few things."Lehighton played very well. They can shoot the ball and they really exploited us from the three-point line. We also didn't have an answer for Chambers inside."Chambers had a monster game as he finished with 11 points, including a thunderous third quarter dunk, and 15 rebounds."Nick has so much talent it's unbelievable," said Oertner. "When he stays inside and doesn't get caught wandering around the perimeter, he's one of the best in the league."Chambers had plenty of help as the Indians placed five players in double figures. Knappenberger scored a game-high 18 points off the bench, Crum added 16, and Zwetolitz (11 points) and Greene (10 points) also made the most of their starting roles."This was an important win for us.," said Oertner. "Blue Mountain is a good team that beat us earlier this season."We've lost a lot of close games to very good teams this year. We've been able to play with everyone, but we just haven't been able to find a way to pull out games against the better teams. With playoffs right around the corner, it was important that we started to do that."BLUE MOUNTAINPuzzi 0-0-0-0, Stramara 1-0-0-3, Kerstetter 2-1-2-5, Welsh 0-0-0-0, Lewis 7-1-3-15, Chelius 6-2-2-17, Albertini 4-2-2-13, Zerbe 1-0-0-2, Biever 1-1-2-3. TOTALS: 22-7-11-58.LEHIGHTONRuzicka 2-0-0-4, Cordova 0-0-0-0, Crum 5-2-3-16, Zwetolitz 3-2-2-11, Ortiz 0-0-0-0, Williams 1-2-2-4, Manogue 0-0-0-0, Budinger 0-0-0-0, McDowell 0-0-0-0, Chambers 5-1-3-11, Knappenberger 8-0-0-18, Greene 4-0-0-10. TOTALS: 28-7-10-74.Blue Mountain 14 15 9 20 - 58Lehighton 15 21 25 13 - 74Three-pointers: BM - Chelius 3, Albertini 3, Stramara 1. L - Crum 4, Zwetolitz 3, Knappenberger 2, Greene 2.

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