Trinity finds scoring touch, gets past Mt. Lebanon

By: Don Rebel
Tuesday, January 26, 2021 | 11:07 PM

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Trinity entered Tuesday’s nonsection game against Mt. Lebanon averaging more than 65 points per game. After a slow start in the opening quarter, the hosts found their touch, and it was all downhill from there.

Thanks to the scoring of senior Michael Dunn, Mt. Lebanon was done as Trinity held on for a 55-50 victory.

Dunn led the Hillers with a game-high 28 points, 25 of them coming after an opening quarter in which Trinity trailed, 12-7.

“We’ve got a lot of inexperienced guys,” Trinity coach Tim Tessmer said. “We have some older guys who just don’t have a ton of minutes under their belt, so they get into these situations and it takes them a little bit to get comfortable.”

Dunn, a 6-foot-3 senior, triggered a big second quarter in which Trinity took control. He scored 11 points as the Hillers outscored the Blue Devils 21-10 to take a 28-22 lead into halftime.

“Michael Dunn is unselfish, but sometimes to a fault,” Tessmer said. “Sometimes we need him to be the guy that just goes out and gets a bucket. He listen to the game plan so much, and we have to tell him, ‘Just go get one,’ and that gets us going a little bit.”

The third quarter was back and forth with Mt. Lebanon using pressure defense to wipe away an eight-point deficit to tie the game with three minutes left, but Trinity finished the third strong and built its biggest lead to 43-33 heading into the fourth quarter.

Dunn not only was a beast with the ball for Trinity, he also worked his magic on both ends of the floor.

After the Blue Devils’ 6-5 Jake Reinke began the game with 10 points in the opening quarter, Tessmer and his staff switched Dunn to guard the senior. It worked as Reinke only scored 13 points the rest of the way.

“It was a matchup we wanted to get,” Tessmer said. “But the way they play, you’re chasing a lot and trying to catch up to him. In the first quarter, he was getting a lot of good looks.”

Mt. Lebanon loves to shoot 3-pointers, and on Tuesday, they just weren’t falling. The Blue Devils finished 11 of 38 from behind the arc and could never get into a rhythm on offense.

The Blue Devils finally made a run with under two minutes left when Reinke connected on a jumper and senior Evan Sentner and Reinke hit back-to-back threes to pull Mt. Lebanon to within three points at 53-50 before the Hillers iced the game with a pair of free throws.

The Hillers (2-1, 4-2) are back in Section 2-5A action Friday when they meet the team they are tied for second place with, Chartiers Valley.

Mt. Lebanon (2-0, 3-3) also is back to section play Friday with a matchup agauinst Canon-McMillan in Section 2-6A.

While this was nonsection, Tessmer felt this was a big game for his team.

“We’re just trying to convince our guys how hard you have to play to win at this level,” Tessmer said. “We won a game last Friday and didn’t play hard enough and got away with one. The guys played hard. It wasn’t pretty. We made a lot of mistakes, but the effort as there and that kind of carried us.”

Tags: Mt. lebanon, Trinity