Preview: Franklin Academy Patriots vs. Chapel Hill Tigers
Two dominant in Hayes Lewis and David Mirikwe are getting ready to go toe-to-toe. The Franklin Academy Patriots and the Chapel Hill Tigers will round out the year against one another at 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday at. Hopefully Franklin Academy focused on turnovers this week since the team gave up 20 on Tuesday.
After a string of three wins, Franklin Academy's good fortune finally ran out. They took a hard 69-53 fall against North Johnston. Franklin Academy has struggled against North Johnston recently, as their contest on Tuesday was their fourth consecutive lost matchup.
The losing side was boosted by Tyler Pace, who scored 18 points. The contest was his sixth in a row with at least ten points. Lewis was another key contributor, scoring 11 points along with seven rebounds and six assists.
Meanwhile, even though Eastern Alamance scored an imposing 63 points last Friday, Chapel Hill still came out on top. It was close, but Chapel Hill ultimately received the gift of a 65-63 victory from a begrudging Tigerssquad. Given their advantage in MaxPreps' North Carolina basketball rankings (they are ranked 39th, while Eastern Alamance is ranked 211th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Mirikwe continued his habit of posting crazy stat lines, scoring 28 points along with five rebounds and four steals. That makes it nine consecutive games in which he has scored at least 25% of Chapel Hill's points. Another player making a difference was Franklin Johnson , who dropped a double-double on 17 points and 11 rebounds.
Franklin Academy's loss dropped their record down to 8-5. As for Chapel Hill, they pushed their record up to 8-1 with that win, which was their sixth straight on the road.
Keep an eye on the arc in Wednesday's matchup: Franklin Academy have made nailing deep shots look easy this year this season, having only averaged 7.3 threes per game. It's a different story for Chapel Hill, though, as they've been averaging only 4.3 threes per game. Given Franklin Academy's sizeable advantage in that area, Chapel Hill will need to find a way to close that gap. Check MaxPreps after the action for a full breakdown of the game and more basketball content.
