The Lewisburg Middle School Tigers experienced the sting of defeat for the first time in nearly two years on Monday night, as they saw their 27-game win streak come to an end with a 43-34 road loss at the hands of the Spring Hill Generals in their season opener.

Having lost the past eight meetings against the Tigers often in blowout fashion, the Generals (3-0) finally stood their ground against LMS in Monday's contest and held a 20-12 lead early in the third quarter.

Spring Hill then had to withstand a Lewisburg rally attempt that saw the Tigers cut the deficit to one point on two different occasions before claiming the nine-point victory.

'Motivation'

"I told the kids that's just the way it goes in basketball and in life. I told them to remember how this feels and to use this as motivation to get better," said Lewisburg coach David Lovell.

Although LMS committed only six turnovers, the Tigers shot just 34 percent (13-of-38) from the field overall, which included an 0-of-10 effort from three-point range.

Spring Hill, conversely, knocked down 4-of-10 attempts from beyond the arc en route to shooting 50 percent (16-of-32) from the floor. The Generals also committed only 11 turnovers and outrebounded the Tigers 28-24.

Despite sitting out much of the first half due to foul trouble, Tiger point guard Caleb Fields poured in a game high 20 points on 7-of-12 shooting to go along with six rebounds.

Missing link

"Having him in foul trouble hurt us a lot. With him being out in the first half, it gave Spring Hill confidence when they got the lead," said Lovell.

K.J. Johnson followed Fields with seven points, while Wesley Walker notched four points. Mitchell Ford and Tavi McLean chipped in two and one point for Lewisburg as well.

Power forward Justin Oden and shooting guard Alex Harrison provided the Generals with a potent inside-outside duo. Oden paced Spring Hill with 17 points and 11 rebounds, while Harrison knocked down three treys and tallied 14 points. Nathan Pipkin, Malachi Young, and Lucas Call rounded out the scoring for the Generals with six, four, and two points respectively.

Early lead

The Tigers inched out to a 4-0 lead midway through the first quarter on a Johnson layup and a pair of free throws, before Spring Hill rattled off seven straight points to pull ahead 7-4 early in the second period.

Ford and Walker scored consecutive layups to give LMS a 8-7 advantage, but the Generals responded with an 11-2 spurt to forge an 18-10 lead late in the first half prior to taking a 18-12 advantage into the break.

After Spring Hill pushed their lead to 20-12 early in the third quarter, the Tigers came roaring back and put together an 11-2 run behind nine points from Fields and a Johnson layup to narrow the gap to 24-23 late in the stanza.

Generals stay ahead

Oden tallied six of the next seven points to push the Generals' lead to 30-24 early in the fourth quarter, before Fields scored five straight points on two layups and a free throws to whittle the deficit to 30-29 with 5:01 left.

Spring Hill, however, managed to weather the LMS flurry and outscored Lewisburg 9-0 over the next 2:50 to open up a 39-29 advantage.

The Tigers closed the gap to 39-34 with 1:19 lead thanks to a couple of layups from Fields and a Johnson free throw, but LMS failed to score again while the Generals tacked on four foul shots to seal their 43-34 win.