Battle Mountain's Aaro Vainiotalo wins the opening tip against West Wendover.
With the regular season coming to an end this week, the Battle Mountain High School boys basketball team did its best to stay within the top three in the Northern 2A standings.
The Longhorns did that, winning two of its three games to improve to 12-4 in league play. The only loss was to West Wendover on Thursday night in Battle Mountain, with the Wolverines winning 54-40. West Wendover paces the Northern 2A at 15-1, followed by Incline at 13-1.
The Longhorns were within a point at 11-10 in the first quarter, when the Wolverines pulled away with the final seven points. That spurt added the first four points of the second quarter, when Zayne Hall stopped the run with an old-fashioned 3-point play. Hall helped Battle Mountain close the gap to 27-25 at the break with a 3-pointer.
The Wolverines grew the advantage to double figures with 4:17 play and the lead never dropped below 10 points.
Battle Mountain got back on the winning track with a 61-32 win at Silver Stage on Friday and 62-39 against Sierra Lutheran on Saturday in Carson City.
Battle Mountain hosts North Tahoe on Friday at 7:30 p.m.
The Lakers are 10-4 in the Northern 2A and beat the Longhorns earlier in the year. The regular season concludes on Saturday versus Incline at 2:30 p.m.
The Northern 2A Regional Tournament features the top six teams and will take place Feb. 13-15 at Pershing County High School in Lovelock.