Peacock's Jared Laxdal sinks two of his 16 points in their win at Central on Tuesday.

After winning three games and the Moose Jaw Invitational title over the weekend, the Peacock Toiler boys didn’t look worn out on Tuesday night.

They were able to get stronger as the game went on during a 92-67 win over the Central Cyclones.  The win improved Peacock to 5-0 to start the year and gives them a two-game lead on the Cyclones for first in the Moose Jaw High School Senior Basketball League.

“I thought especially the second half, we really got some good spots defensively and then executed offensively,” said Bryan Adams, Peacock head coach.  “We played a good solid game the entire game, but especially the second half.”

A 43-point second half pushed the Toilers to the win as they took advantage of some Central mistakes.  Peacock used their strong defensive play in the half to power their offence and pulled away from the Cyclones.

“This is a very tough place to play and they’re a very solid team and we knew that they were going to come at us very hard,” said Adams. “We withstood that and in the second half we started exerting some of the things we do well and had a nice result because of it.”

The game was tight throughout the first half with Central trailing just one, 17-16, after the opening frame.  Peacock went into half-time up 49-45 thanks to a late three-pointer from Braeden Crone.

“We played them straight up in the first half and our guys battled hard, but they just ran out of a bit steam in the third and fourth quarter,” said Leigh Pethick, Central head coach.

“The guys did exactly what we were trying to coach them for in regards to this game,” added Pethick.  “We pressured Ryder (Epoch) as much as we could and we tried to limit them to second chance opportunities, but in the second half that kind of got away from us.”

Peacock’s depth was no doubt the difference as they had five players score in double digits, led by Epoch, who poured in 18 points in the win.  Crone wasn’t far behind with 17, while Eric Forbes and Jared Laxdal each had 16.

The Cyclones seemed to wear out a little bit quicker than the Toilers during the second half.

“It’s a little bit of fatigue, a little bit of everything, but they’re just a great team,” said Pethick.  “We’d have to play a perfect game to be in the game with them and we did that in the first half, and then we’ve just got to move it to three and four quarters now.”

It was a closer finish than the last time the two teams met with Central taking that as a building block going forward into their final meeting of the season on February 13th.

Peacock keeps their perfect in tact for one more week, but Adams feels they still have room to grow as a team.

“Sometimes we still get caught up with one-on-one match ups and that kind of stuff and sometimes team play goes out the window with that,” said Adams.  “That’s an on-going thing that we’re working on.

“I think we have a much higher ceiling this year, we’re not near what we think we can be by the end of the year.  There’s still a lot of work and the kids are buying in and we’re very excited about the season.”

There were a pair of girls games on Tuesday as well.  The Peacock Toiler girls remained undefeated at 4-0 with an 85-60 win over the Central Cyclones in the early game of the doubleheader.  Libby Epoch had 26 points for Peacock in the win.

Vanier also won their first game of the season, heading into Assiniboia and knocking off the Rockets, 52-39.  Tori Beattie scored 15 points for the Spirits in the win.