Purple Eagles top Tigers for 5th straight win
Streaking Albion made it five Niagara-Orleans league wins in a row by defeating visiting Akron 66-50 this evening on Senior Night.
Tyler Gibson scored 15 and Jahmeek Riley 14 to lead the attack for Albion which has come on strong after a slow 0-6 start to the N-O campaign. Shakarion Drisdom and Caleb Fox both added 9 for the Purple Eagles as Aquil Gaffney chipped in with 6, Luqman Cornick 5, Javon Jones 4 and Ozzie Matos and Dylan Narburgh 2 each.
Donny Kreher took game high honors with 18 and Andrew Romesser 15 on five threes to pace Akron which slips to 3-8 in N-O action.
Romesser hit three threes and Brodie Hibbard one to spark Akron out to a 16-11 first period lead.
However, Albion answered with a 16-9 second period scoring edge to take the lead for good by a narrow 27-25 margin at the half. Fox hit two threes and Gibson had a pair of baskets to lead the Purple Eagles during that stretch.
The Purple Eagles then put together a key 10-0 scoring burst to open the third quarter and extend the lead to 12, 37-25. Fox and Drisdom both had threes to highlight the uprising.
Akron did close back to within five, 41-36, late in the period as Kreher had a total of 10 in the stanza including four for four from the free throw line.
A late three by Riley though kept Albion up by six, 44-38, at the three-quarter mark.
Back-to-back baskets by Gaffney upped the Purple Eagles lead to 10, 48-38, at the outset of the final period and the Tigers could get no closer than seven after that.
Gaffney scored 6, Riley 5 and Jones 4 in the final period to keep Albion in control.
The Purple Eagles will close out the N-O season at front-running Roy-Hart on Thursday.