By Ron Poniewasz Jr.
New Castle News

The Wilmington High boys basketball team came back to the pack a bit last night.

The second-place Greyhounds had a chance to build their lead over the District 10, Region 2-AA field but dropped a 64-50 region road matchup to Greenville.

Wilmington (4-2 region, 7-10 overall) would have remained just a game back of region-leading Lakeview (6-0, 14-4), which routed Reynolds (2-4, 9-8), 61-26.

Sharpsville (3-3, 9-8) held off Mercer (0-6, 4-13) to climb within a game of the Greyhounds.

“We’re still in second place; that’s the good news,” Wilmington coach Mike Jeckavitch said. “We just need to bounce back and beat Reynolds (on Tuesday).”

The Trojans (3-3, 9-9) built a 30-25 halftime lead behind strong perimeter shooting. Chad Ferguson made four of the team’s six 3-pointers, including all four in the opening half. Ferguson was blanked in the second half.

“They hit some open 3s early in the game,” Jeckavitch said. “We switched up our defense in the second half on Ferguson.”

Anthony Derrick recorded a team-high 18 points for the Greyhounds. Jordan Smith chipped in with 10 markers and a team-best eight rebounds.

Josh Tekac snared six boards for Wilmington and Ryan Crawford notched four steals.

“We fought through foul trouble and battled hard the whole game,” Jeckavitch said. “That’s what I want from my guys.”

Nico Zahniser tossed in a game-high 23 points for Greenville.