New Palestine High School

The first half belonged to Julius Gizzi. The second half simply belonged to the New Palestine boys basketball team in a 71-52 victory over Perry Meridian. Gizzi scored 21 points of his game-high 27 points in the first half - 19 in an extended run that put the Dragons up 31-15. Perry Meridian's Anthony Towns answered with 17 first-half points, most coming in a second-quarter spurt that twice drew his Falcons within nine. But as they each became the focal point of the defensive gameplan in the second half, the Dragons’ depth shone as they pulled away to the victory. The Dragons held Towns to six second-half points - half coming on a deep 3-pointer. Meanwhile, Ben Slagley caught fire in the third quarter, hitting a driving three-point play and following it up with a 3-pointer out of the corner. He finished with 11 points. Gizzi added six third-quarter points to help the Dragons extend their lead to 15, then Moses Haynes and Evan Darrah hit three consecutive triples - Darrah’s second a four-point play - to push the lead as high as 25 in the fourth. Haynes finished with eight points and Darrah seven. All 12 Dragons played and 10 scored in the victory. Alex Guhl came in off the bench and gave the Dragons strong defense on Towns, while also scoring six first-half points to tie his season high. Rigg Mahurin scored four points, while Landon Seib, Brady Armstrong, Austin McMahan and Evan Study scored two each. In the opening half, it was the Gizzi and Towns show. Towns was solid early as PM jumped out to a 9-6 lead. But then Gizzi started to take over, hitting a basket, drawing a foul, then scoring again and adding another off a backcourt steal to score eight straight points and put the Dragons on top 14-9. After two free throws by Towns, Gizzi added a three-point play and a volleyball-line 3-pointer to give NP a 24-13 lead after one. He opened the second with another triple and two free throws, giving him 19 points in the 25-6 run that put NP up 31-15. Towns led the Falcons’ response as PM cut the deficit to nine on two occasions. A basket by McMahan off a feed from Gizzi answered one, and Guhl spinning a layup off the rim and in at the first-half buzzer put NP up 37-26 at the break. The Dragons won the JV game 53-43. The Dragons are next in action Saturday afternoon at Southport, with a 1 p.m. JV tip followed by the varsity at 2:30 p.m.