Second-Half Run Lifts Eagles on Senior Night
SHEFFIELD, Mass. – Matt Lowe scored 24 points, and the Mount Everett boys basketball team used a 13-0 run that spanned the third and fourth quarters to earn a 72-56 win over Hampden Charter on Friday night.
Lowe, one of five seniors on the Eagles, hit six 3-pointers on Senior Night as Mount Everett improved to 11-6 with one game left in the regular season.
Sophomore Brady Carpenter had a double-double with 11 points, 12 rebounds and a pair of assists.
But the night belonged to the Class of ‘25.
“It’s amazing,” Lowe said of the Senior Night win. “We’ve worked our whole lives for this.
“We’ve all been playing together since [grades] 3-4. So to come out here and share the court one last time – it’s amazing.”
The Eagles (11-6) likely will get on that court a couple more times. They finish the regular season on Monday at home against Lee and could end up with a home game in the preliminary round of the Division 5 State Tournament.
Still, Friday was a night for reminiscing … and revenge.
Mount Everett dropped a 72-60 decision at Hampden Charter nearly a month ago on a night when the Eagles led, 24-11, after one quarter.
“Last time, we hit every shot in the first quarter, so we thought we were going to get away with it,” Lowe said. “Then they came back, and we started to fall apart. This game, we didn’t underestimate them.”
The Wolves gave the hosts every reason to worry in the first half, getting 18 points from Jaylin Coles-Williams and six rebounds from Zaeshaun Bell before half-time.
Hampden Charter led by as many as seven when Coles-Williams knocked down a deep 3-pointer early in the second quarter to make it 21-14.
Lowe stopped an 8-0 Hampden Charter run with a 3-pointer, and the Eagles tied it, 23-23, midway through the second on a drive to the basket by Darius Taliaferro, who scored 10 points.
The teams went back and forth from there until half-time with Mount Everett tying the score, 30-30 on a basket by Carpenter assisted by Trevor Leonard.
Hampden Charter went up briefly by six in the third quarter, but Sean Warren (nine points) set up Carpenter for a basket to make it 38-34, and it was a two-possession game for several minutes.
Just before the end of the quarter, the Eagles got a bucket in transition from Lowe and Leonard basket assisted by Taliaferro to take their biggest lead of the night at 49-42.
One big difference in the second half: Mount Everett held Coles-Williams scoreless after the break.
Mount Everett mixed man-to-man and a 2-3 zone in the first half but stayed with the zone in the second half.
“He was taking some deep shots,” Eagles coach Jowe Warren said of Coles-Williams, who had three 3-pointers. “Other 3-point shooters, we are able to hedge those screens because they’re a little closer to the line. But he was going so far out and hitting shots that we went to a 2-3 but extended guys out on him and cheated on that side a little bit just to try to slow him down.”
Mount Everett carried the momentum from the end of the third quarter into the fourth, scoring the first nine points. Lowe’s sixth triple of the game put the Eagles on top, 58-42.
The teams traded baskets from there with Hampden Charter never getting back within single digits.
Before the game, Warren talked about the example that the school’s Class of ‘25 set for youth basketball players in Sheffield.
Afterward, he mentioned that this might be the first time in school history that the Mount Everett boys have a chance to go four years in a row with a winning record.
He also talked in the pregame ceremonies about how grateful he was to get to coach this squad for four years, especially after he gave his son Sean a choice in whether he wanted to be coached by his father in high school.
“It’s hard as a father because you can’t sit there and cheer for them and be on the sidelines just cheering for your kid,” Jowe Warren said. “So it’s been fun watching him grow. I’m lucy enough that he had a good group of kids around him as well. It’s such a fun group to coach – really respectful young men.”
Photos from this game to come.