The Harrison Panthers will square off against the Mesa Ridge Grizzlies at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Expect the scorekeeper to be kept busy: if their previous games are any indication, the two teams will really light up the scoreboard.
Having struggled with four losses in a row, Harrison turned things around against Coronado on Wednesday. They put the hurt on the Cougars with a sharp 60-37 win.
Meanwhile, Mesa Ridge had already won 12 in a row (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 11.4 points) and they went ahead and made it 13 on Wednesday. They strolled past the Gladiators with points to spare, taking the game 60-45. Given the Grizzlies' advantage in MaxPreps' Colorado basketball rankings (they are ranked 22nd, while the Gladiators are ranked 212th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Mesa Ridge's victory was their 13th straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 13-1. Those victories came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 65.2 points per game. As for Harrison, their win was their first in the league, bumping their league record up to 1-3 and their overall record up to 4-9.
Harrison was dealt a bruising 68-37 defeat at the hands of Mesa Ridge in their previous meeting two weeks ago. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Mesa Ridge's Zander Iwanski, who went 9 of 16 en route to 18 points in addition to seven rebounds and seven steals. Now that Harrison knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
