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STAR CORRESPONDENT

On Wednesday afternoon at the ninth annual Thanksgiving Classic played at Sullivan East High School, the Unaka Rangers dug a hole they could not get out of as they fell to Mount Mission School 68-55. The Rangers (1-4 overall) fell behind 22-10 after one period in which they turned the ball over nine times.

“You can’t turn the ball over against a good team,” Rangers head coach Aaron Dugger said. “Until these guys take some pride in taking care of the basketball and stop making errant passes. Until we get that fixed, we are going to struggle.”

Unaka trailed 38-21 at the half and took the second half by four points, 34-30 but it wasn’t nearly enough as the Rangers had 26 total turnovers.

Senior post Marcus Shomaker had a team-high 12 points and took down 10 rebounds for a double-double and freshman John Hardin scored 10 points and had eight rebounds. Junior guard Mason Wilson added 10 points for Unaka.

The Rangers connected on five-of-14 (35.7 percent) tries from three-point range, while the Challengers were six-for-27 (22.2 percent).

“We have had 20-plus turnovers in both games we have played here,” Dugger said. “I don’t know how to fix their decision making. All I know is until we fix this, we will struggle.”

For the Challengers, four players scored in double figures with Abet Mesfin scoring a game-high 15 points. Imana Chacha scored 13 points with Kaab Dawit adding 11 and Alex Nyakemori finishing with 10.

Mount Mission 68-55

Mount Mission (68)

Chacha 13, Wolde 2, K. Dawit 4, Nyakenori 10, Wondimu 2, Corey 5, Mesfin 15, Burusi 6,

Maginga 3, E. Dawit 8.

Unaka (55)

Walsh 2, Wilson 10, Crabtree 5, Lewis 8, J. Deyton 2, Shomaker 12, Lambert 6, Hardin 10.

Mount Mission 22 16 17 13 – 68

Unaka 10 11 19 15 – 55

3-point goals: MM 6 (Chacha 2, Burusi 2, Mesfin 1, Maginga 1), U 5 (Lewis 2, Wilson 2,

Crabtree 1)