Douglas County boys basketball hangs on to defeat Bear Creek

Bear Creek senior Slade Marceau (15) had a game-high 23 points, but it wasn’t enough as Douglas County beat the Bears. (Dennis Pleuss/Jeffco Athletics)

LAKEWOOD — Douglas County’s youth helped its boys basketball team grab a 87-80 road victory over Bear Creek on Monday night.

Douglas County sophomores TJ Boykins (19 points) and Davon Walker (18 points) led the way for the Huskies (3-3 record) in the non-conference victory over Bear Creek (2-3). However, it was Douglas County freshman Brendan Temple who sealed the victory scoring nine of his 14 points in the final four minutes to hold off a fourth-quarter rally by the Bears.

The Huskies led by as much as 22 points — 66-44 — with 3 minutes to play in the third quarter, but a handful of runs late in the third and in the fourth quarter allowed Bear Creek to get as close as 76-72 with 3:36 to play in the final quarter.

Bear Creek’s 6-foot-4 senior Slade Marceau scored a game-high 23 points. Juniors Manuel Perez (13 points), Landon Cornell (10 points), Nick Duran (five points), along with senior Walker Rumsey (16 points) got hot for the Bears in the second half to make a game of it.

Douglas County was able to hold on in the fourth quarter to end a two-game losing streak. The Huskies host Palmer on Wednesday this week before the holiday break.

You can call it the pre-holiday rush week for Bear Creek’s boys basketball team.

The Bears won’t have much time to finish off holiday shopping with three games this week before the winter break. Bear Creek started its busy stretch of three games in five days Monday night.

Guided by first-year coach Will Gosch, Bear Creek has road games against Kennedy (Tuesday) and Arapahoe (Friday) before nearly a two-week break between games. The Bears open their 5A Jeffco League schedule on the road against Arvada West on Thursday, Jan. 5.

The Bears are looking be at or above the .500 winning percentage mark for the first time in nearly a decade. The last time Bear Creek didn’t have a losing record at the end of the season was the 2007-08 season. The Bears went 12-12 under then coach Steve Hyatt.