The Hills-Beaver Creek boys overcame a sluggish start to register their fourth-consecutive basketball victory Thursday in Edgerton.

After falling behind by 16 points in the first seven-minutes of the game, H-BC’s run of wins appeared to be in peril.

The Patriots, however, rallied to outscore Edgerton 75-45 the rest of the night to secure an 82-68 victory.

The Flying Dutchmen scored the game’s first eight points on the way to opening a 16-point lead (23-7) at the 11:01 mark of the first half.

The rest of the stanza belonged to the Patriots.

H-BC put together a 25-11 run ending with a field goal from Jeff Sandbulte to open a 42-34 cushion with 37 seconds remaining in the stanza.

Edgerton trimmed the difference to six points moments later, but Sandbulte buried a three with eight seconds left to give the Patriots a 45-36 advantage at the break.

Dylan Gehrke scored the first two points of the second half to give H-BC an 11-point lead (47-36) that dwindled to four points (48-44) when EHS put together an 8-1 spurt that ended with 14:01 left to play.

H-BC responded to the challenge by going on a 34-17 run ending with a field goal from Sandbulte that left H-BC sporting a 17-point lead (82-65) before prevail by 14 points at game’s end.

Sandbulte (34 points, 11 rebounds and three assists) and Gehrke (23 points and seven rebounds) played key roles in the win for H-BC.

Carey Taubert chipped in 10 points and Jon Gallagher added 11 rebounds.

Box score

Gehrke 4 4 3-3 23, Ellingson 00 3-4 3, Bass 2 0 0-0 4, Sandbulte 9 4 4-8 34, Wilhelmi 0 0 0-0 0, Holthaus 0 0 0-0 0, Taubert 5 0 0-0 10, Gallagher 2 0 2-5 6, Tilstra 0 0 0-0 0, Kerkhove-Brandt 1 0 0-0 2.

Team statistics

H-BC: 31 of 66 field goals (47 percent), 12 of 20 free throws (60 percent), 41 rebounds, eight turnovers.