Greene County Daily World: High School Sports: Fourth quarter costs the Bulldogs (12/04/09)

Clay City outscored visiting Union 22-11 in the fourth quarter as the Eels defeated the Bulldogs 50-38 in a dual conference high school boys basketball game in Clay County on Friday night.

The Bulldogs, who are now 0-3, 0-2 in the Southwestern Indiana Athletic Conference and 0-1 in the Tri-River Conference, owned a 19-16 lead at the half but fell behind 28-27 after three quarters.

"We are getting better every game," said Union Coach Clarence Johnson. "The kids played hard once again.

"We started settling for some shots that might have been OK if we were making them. We might have been able to get some better looks. Because of that, Clay City was able to take the momentum away from us as they caught a couple of breaks."

Johnson said they had a few lapses that cost them, putting them in catch-up mode.

"Clay City got to the foul line 14 times in the fourth quarter," said Johnson. "We got behind and had to start gambling and fouling. That allowed them to build up their lead.

"We had some great looks at the basket at times, but could not get them to go down in the fourth quarter."

Johnson said the final score was deceptive.

"This definitely was not a 12-point game," said Johnson. "The final score is by no means indicative of how close this game was."

Ethan Fettig hit for 11 points to pace Union. Tyler Talpas added nine.

Clay City won the junior varsity contest 44-33.

The Bulldogs will host Eminence at 6 p.m. tonight in a TRC game.

"This is a big conference weekend for us. We have no time to sulk as Eminence comes to our place Saturday night," said Johnson. "We have to continue to work on getting better and not get down on ourselves."

UNION (38) -- Dustin Howard 3 0-1 6, Ethan Fettig 5 1-3 11, Trent Collins 1 0-1 2, Tyler Talpas 2 4-4 9, Jacob Phegley 2 0-0 4, Tanner Reynolds 0 0-0 0, Brandon Duncan 0 0-0 0, Seth Gambill 3 0-2 6. Totals 16 5-11 38.

CLAY CITY (50) -- Newton 1 3-5 5, Denker 4 4-4 13, Jenkins 1 0-1 2, Higgins 3 2-5 8, Tiefel 2 1-5 5, Bridgewater 4 1-1 9, Moore 2 4-6 8, Decker 0 0-0 0. Totals 17 15-17 50.

Union 10 9 8 11 -- 38

Clay City 9 7 12 22 -- 50

3-pointers -- Union 1 (Talpas), Clay City 1 (Denker). Fouls -- Union 21, Clay City 14. Fouled out -- Denker.