The Fergus Falls boys basketball team opened their home season with a 65-56 win over the Breckenridge Cowboys on Friday night at the Kennedy Secondary School Gold gymnasium. The Otters led 28-19 at halftime, increased their lead to 46-30 and held off a comeback attempt by the Cowboys to secure the win.

After the Otters scored the first two points of the second half to take a 30-19 lead, Breckenridge rattled off nine straight points to cut the lead to 30-28. A 16-2 run by the Otters kicked their lead up to sixteen points at 46-30, however, the Cowboys scored eleven consecutive points to trim the lead to 46-41. Fergus Falls was able to increase the lead to a dozen and close the game out with a nine point win.

Senior Matthew Johnsonscored 20 points, pulled down 6 rebounds, dished out 5 assists and took three charges to lead the Otters. Sophomore Dominic Aguilar finished with 12 points and 3 assists and senior Nic Pearson had 11 points and 6 rebounds. Ethan Olson contributed 9 points and 6 rebounds, and Ashwin Stratton added 9 points and 2 assists.

Fergus Falls forced 30 Breckenridge turnovers in the game.

“We played a hard fought game against one of the top teams in our area,” commented Breckenridge Assistant Coach Derek Grahn. “Unfortunately, we had a number of mistakes that stopped us from getting over the hump. We have a lot of guys stepping into new roles this year so we expect to have some growing pains early in the year. We will have our home opener next Tuesday and look forward to having a great turnout from out Cowboy faithful.”

Leading scorers for the Cowboys were Jacob Marsh with 14, Noah Christensen with 12 and Hunter Feigum with 10. Christensen completed a double-double by snaring 17 rebounds and Feigum grabbed six boards.

Fergus Falls will host Brainerd on Thursday night and then travel to Princeton for a game on Friday.