BURLINGTON – Fort Madison’s slugfest through the Southeast Conference continued Friday night as the Hounds fell to Burlington 49-44 as the regular season winds down.
Hunter Cresswell again led the Bloodhounds with 20 points, but Merquiche Lewis led all scorers with 23 to help the Grayhounds to the win.
The Bloodhounds fall to 1-9 in the Southeast and 6-13 overall, with two more regular season game left at Muscatine on Saturday and then Ottumwa on Tuesday. The Grayhounds improve to 7-3 and 14-6 overall.
Burlington held a 13-8 lead at the end of the first quarter, but Fort Madison came around in the second period, holding BHS to just nine points.
Fort Madison turned to Cresswell in the second quarter for eight points and ran past the Grayhounds 19-9 for a 27-22 halftime lead.
The Bloodhounds have had trouble late getting the outside game going, while Cresswell gets the brunt of the defensive attention working inside the lane. Carson Rashid finished with eight points, while Noah Swigart and Leif Boeding each had seven.
Burlington turned the tables in the third quarter and held Fort Madison to just four points on a bucket each from Cresswell and Swigart.
Burlington would extend the lead to 14 at 47-33, but then the Bloodhounds would turn things around and make a rally. Trailing by 10 with less than three minutes left, Fort Madison would turn up the pressure and cut the lead to five with a minute left while the Grayhounds went cold from the free throw the line.
But Fort Madison couldn't cut into the lead any deeper in the final 60 seconds.
“We had our chances tonight. They missed quite a few free throws down the stretch,” Wilson said.
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