Brookfield Central's strong first quarter leads to victory over Wauwatosa East

Brookfield Central jumped off to a fast start Friday and whipped Wauwatosa East’s boys basketball team, 58-42, and it was the same old story for both teams.

Central improved to 9-1 and stayed tied for first place in the Greater Metro Conference with Sussex Hamilton, each with 5-0 records, while Tosa East fell to 6-5 overall and to fourth place (3-2) in the GMC.

The Lancers jumped off to a 22-6 first quarter lead and then the teams played to a 36-36 tie the rest of the way.

Whereas Central continues to find ways to win — they drilled four 3-pointers in the first period — the Red Raiders once again couldn’t put together four good quarters against a quality opponent.

Again Central junior guard Riley LaChance had nine points with two 3-pointers and Peter Mattiacci threw in two 3-pointers to spark the first quarter run.

“That’s been our big thing. If you want to be a champion you have to have the characteristics of a champion,” Central coach Mark Adams said. “One of the things is how hard you come out. Our thing is to try and outwork people and we were doing that.”

Tosa East had only three players score in the first half — Anthony Carroll had six and Nate Moore and Ben Mihelich had five each. LaChance had 11 and Elijah Goodman had eight points and seven rebounds at intermission for Central.

Carroll got hot with 10 of his 16 points in the third quarter, while LaChance eight and junior Caleb Mortag had three dunks.

Central led 34-16 at halftime and 50-32 after three periods.

“It’s a broken record really,” a frustrated Tosa East each coach Tim Arndorfer said. “When you look at the box score. Another quality opponent, we’re right there, but this time it was the first quarter.

“Other games its been the fourth quarter, we had games where its been the second quarter. There is no rhyme or reason to when it was going to happen.”

LaChance led all scorers with 21 and Goodman had 12 and 13 rebounds.