By John Rittenhouse
The Hills-Beaver Creek boys' basketball team tasted defeat for the first time since 2001 when it traveled to Fulda for a Red Rock Conference tilt Tuesday.
It looked as if the Patriots might extend their season-long winning streak to nine straight games in the first quarter, but Fulda took over the rest of the night and secured a 72-56 victory.
The loss was H-BC's first setback since Dec. 21, when it dropped a home game to Southwest Christian. The 11-5 Patriots will try to start another winning streak when they host Adrian tomorrow.
H-BC appeared to be in good shape when Matt Buck netted six points to lead the Patriots to an 18-12 lead during the first quarter in Fulda.
The Raiders, however, took control of the contest by outscoring H-BC 60-38 the rest of the night.
Fulda moved into a 31-28 halftime lead by outscoring H-BC 19-10 in the second period before doubling the Patriots' scoring output (22-11) in the third quarter to make it a 53-39 game.
The Raiders inflated the final margin of victory to 16 points with a 19-17 scoring edge in the final eight minutes of play.
Trey Van Wyhe played a strong game for the Patriots by scoring 10 points and nabbing five rebounds.
Brad Haak led H-BC with 12 points, while Darin DeBoer pulled down a team-high five rebounds.
Box score
Metzger 1 0 0-0 2, D.DeBoer 0 2 2-4 8, Roozenboom 0 0 0-1 0, Van Maanen 1 0 0-0 2, Haak 5 0 2-2 12, Leuthold 0 0 0-0 0, L.DeBoer 2 1 1-2 8, Van Wyhe 2 0 6-7 10, Top 0 1 5-6 8, Buck 3 0 0-0 6, Krull 0 0 0-0 0.
Team statistics
H-BC: 18 of 51 field goals (35 percent), 16 of 22 free throws (73 percent), 29 rebounds, 15 turnovers.
Fulda: 28 of 64 field goals (44 percent), seven of 10 free throws (70 percent), 35 rebounds, 11 turnovers.