JANUARY 17, 2020 - COVINGTON
The Covington Buccaneers and the Miami East Vikings. It’s a rivalry that spans generations.

Which is why you can expect the intensity level to be at an all-time high and a large crowd on hand when the two schools hook up in nearly any athletic competition.

And Friday’s matchup between the Buccs and Vikings at Covington High School was no different. It was a packed house as the two schools came together to raise money for a good cause, Coaches vs Cancer - a cause much bigger than the result of a high school basketball game.

In regards to the game, Covington started fast and Miami East finished strong in what was an exciting contest from start to finish. In the end though, it was the visiting Vikings walking off the floor with an impressive 58-45 win.

But it wasn’t without some adversity as the Buccaneers jumped out to a 14-6 lead with 2:00 left in the opening frame thanks to treys by Kleyton Maschino and Wes Gooding to go along with two buckets each by Zach Kuntz and Spencer Brumbaugh.

Miami East found its groove and outscored Covington 25-5 over the remainder of the first half as Sam Zapadka got hot with a pair of three bombs, two runners and three free throws. Noah Kings and Tyler Stapleton also dropped in a pair of treys to help push the Miami East lead to 31-19 at the break.

After scoring the opening bucket of the second half, Covington’s shooting woes continued throughout much of the third period. Miami East went on a 9-0 run to push its advantage to 40-21 to force a Covington timeout.

After an earful from Coach Ratermann, the Buccaneers closed out the third quarter on an 8-2 run to keep the game within striking distance with eight minutes to go, 42-29.

Covington caught fire to start the opening frame and closed the gap to 49-43 with just over three-minutes left on the clock.

Unfortunately for the Buccaneers the clock became the enemy as they were forced to foul a solid free throw shooting Viking squad down the stretch.

And Miami East made the Buccs pay by canning nine of 11 free throws in the fourth quarter to pull away for the 13-point win.

For Covington, it can look back at many missed opportunities inside the paint and its inability to take advantage of free points at the charity stripe. In all, the Buccs made just four of 12 free throws.

Miami East took advantage of a great performance by Sam Zapadka, who led all scorers with a game-high 23 points. The Vikings were also money from the free throw line as they converted on 17 of 23 free throws.

Collin Gudorf also dropped in 14 critical points for Miami East, while Covington was led in scoring by Zach Kuntz and Kleyton Maschino, who had 12 points each.

BOX SCORE:

MIAMI EAST (58)
Sam Zapadka - 23
Collen Gudorf - 14
Noah King - 8
Brendon Bertsch - 8
Tyler Stapleton - 3
Aaron Lawrence - 2

COVINGTON (45)
Zach Kuntz - 12
Kleyton Maschino - 12
Spencer Brumbaugh - 6
Jake Hamilton - 5
Kadin Presser - 4
Wes Gooding - 3
Owen Boehringer - 3

THREE-POINT SCORING:
Miami East - Sam Zapadka (3), Noah King (2), Tyler Stapleton (1), Collen Gudorf (1)
Covington - Kleyton Maschino (2), Wes Gooding (1)