North Adams ends Fairfield’s 39-game regular-season winning streak

North Adams' Bransyn Copas and Fairfield's Trey House battle in their Southern Hills Athletic Conference game, Friday at Grandle Gymnasium. (HCP Photo/Stephen Forsha)
LEESBURG — Every sports winning streak eventually comes to an end, and Friday night, after 39 consecutive regular-season wins, the Fairfield Lions saw their regular-season winning streak come to a close after nearly a two-year span.
In a chaotic game that included large leads, comebacks, three technical fouls and some intense moments, the Lions suffered their first loss of the 2023-24 season — and first regular-season loss since Feb. 11, 2021 — with the North Adams Green Devils coming to Grande Gymnasium and defeating the Lions, 59-50.
From the start, the previously undefeated Lions (9-1, 16-1) were in a hole against the SHAC-undefeated Green Devils (8-0, 11-3), trailing by a 15-5 score at the end of the first quarter. From there, the Green Devils never trailed and fended off momentum swings forced by the Lions.
Ultimately, Fairfield wasn’t able to make a comeback as some emotional moments led to Fairfield head coach Quentin Williams being handed two technical fouls, which led to him being escorted from the game. Both technical fouls were called by the same official from across the court.
As for the slow start for the Lions, North Adams struck first with two free throws less than a minute into the game made by Bransyn Copas. Fairfield tied the score — their only tied score of the game — with a layup by Larkin Friend at the 6:29 mark of the first for a 2-2 score.
Next was an 11-0 run by the Green Devils with points scored by Cody Hesler, Jayce Rothwell — who stole the ball three straight times and scored points all three times — and a 3-pointer by Breestin Schweickart for a 13-2 lead with around 3:00 left in the first quarter.
Following three turnovers combined by both teams, it was Fairfield finally breaking the run of North Adams with a layup and free throw for a three-point play with 1:49 left in the opening quarter for a 13-5 deficit. The Green Devils added one final basket in the paint with 1:23 left in the first for the 10-point advantage at 15-5.
“Having a slow start plays a big part of it,” Williams told The Highland County Press. “(North Adams) does a good job of pressuring the ball, they are fast, and they have a bunch of guards who can handle the ball extremely well. They sped us up early, turned us over and they did a good job, and we played right into their game plan instead of our plan, so credit to them for them bringing the energy.
“I just think they competed as the overall team harder than we did (Friday). We had several people compete, but not overall as a team, and that’s what we talked about in the locker room after the game.”
Williams continued to speak about Friday’s game.
“North Adams made timely shots and they got timely possessions, and we can’t make any excuses for any of the extracurricular stuff or anything else that happened tonight,” Williams said. “We had plenty of opportunities where we missed some layups, and missed some bunnies in the fourth quarter to really shrink the lead. We’d get close to take the lead with open shots, but unfortunately we just didn’t make them tonight, and we weren’t in a position to grab those rebounds.
“Like I said, credit to North Adams. They brought the energy, and they did a good job tonight.”
The Lions outscored the Green Devils 10-7 in the second, getting to within four points of the lead twice, and trailing by 10 points with 5:53 left in the quarter.
North Adams’ points in the second quarter came from five points by Copas and two points from Connor Young. The Lions scored first in the second with two points by Cade Miller, and later those points were followed by consecutive 3-pointers by Fairfield’s Friend and Trey House, bringing the Lions to within four points of the lead at 17-13 with 3:38 left in the first half.
The Lions eventually trailed 22-15 at halftime, and when the third quarter ended, it was North Adams leading by eight points at 40-32.
The third frame is when things started becoming a little heated with the Lions and Green Devils each receiving a technical foul called on them, with Fairfield at the 5:14 mark of the third, and North Adams receiving theirs with 2:26 left in the same quarter.
North Adams in the third built their lead to as many as 16 points, and FHS got to within five points of the lead with 2:14 left in the same frame.
Fairfield had Friend go 5-of-6 from the free-throw line in the third, House scored seven points (including a 3-pointer with 3:20 on the clock), and Logan McIntosh scored six points.
Even with the Lions scoring 17 points, they still had a point added to their deficit in the third with North Adams scoring 18 points in the quarter. Rothwell was responsible for 10 of these 18 points by the Green Devils. Hesler added four points for NAHS in the third, while Young and Schweickart each scored two points.
The first points of the fourth frame for the Lions came with 6:05 on the clock as Miller knocked down a 3-pointer, but the next points in the fourth weren’t scored again until the 5:02 mark with House sinking a 3-pointer. Next came four points scored by Rothwell of North Adams, and after multiple travel calls and turnovers by each team, the Green Devils added to their lead with 1:49 left in the fourth off a free throw made by Schweickart.
Then more chaos ensued as the second technical was called on the Lions, as an official called a foul on a play, then the technical foul. Those calls saw Rothwell sink four consecutive free throws for the Green Devils with 1:21 left in regulation, with NAHS leading 49-38.
The Green Devils continued to add to their lead, ultimately winning by nine points and handing the Lions their first loss of the season.
For the game, the Lions were led by Friend with 25 points, followed by House with 13 points, McIntosh with seven points and Miller with five points.
North Adams was led by Rothwell with 26 points (as he was 10-of-10 from the free-throw line), followed by Schweickart with 15 points. The rest of the final NAHS scoring included Copas (eight), Hesler (six) and Young (four).
As for seeing their perfect regular-season streak end, Williams spoke about what it has been like to be a part of the pressure that is winning 39 consecutive regular-season games.
“What these kids have built, this is the first time Larkin Friend has lost a regular-season game as a point guard in his two-year varsity tenure,” Williams said. “I’d like to say the pressure is not real when trying to be perfect and being undefeated for over two years, but the pressure is real, and my kids and I even feel it every single day, so it is hard to be perfect, but we try to do it together.
“Eventually I could always tell them we have to do things the right way or we are going to fall down, and like I said, tonight we just didn’t do as many things right as we should have, and all credit goes to North Adams as they did a really good job.
“This is a learning experience for us,” Williams continued. “This is the first time we felt this together in the regular season, so we’ll learn from this, come together more as a group, lean on each other and we’ll be prepared moving forward.”
Next for the Lions is an away non-conference game on Tuesday, Jan. 30 in Highland County against the host Hillsboro Indians at 7:30 p.m.
North Adams plays again Saturday, Jan. 27 on the road at Portsmouth with a 7:30 p.m. start.
BOX SCORE
NAHS 15 07 18 19 — 59
FHS 05 10 17 18 — 50
NORTH ADAMS (59) — J.Rothwell 8 (0) 10-10 26, C.Hesler 3 (0) 0-0 6, C.Young 2 (0) 0-0 4, B.Copas 1 (1) 3-4 8, B.Schweickart 4 (1) 4-6 15. TOTALS: 18 (2) 17-20 59.
FAIRFIELD (50) — L.Friend 5 (2) 9-11 25, T.House 1 (3) 1-3 13, L.McIntosh 3 (0) 1-2 7, C.Miller 1 (1) 0-0 5. TOTALS: 10 (6) 11-16 50.