Fresh off of the best season in program history, Pusch Ridge moved to 5-2 overall and 3-0 in power-ranking games after the Lions beat Walden Grove 58-52 at home Thursday night.

The Lions finished 26-5 last year and fell to Valley Christian 57-44 in the 3A championship game but that group included seven seniors including four of the top five scorers. Jared Clark (18.8), Lucas Elliott (13.4), Brandon Ripperdan (7.2) and Josiah Noller (6.5) accounted for 73% of the Lion offense and the senior standouts stayed on the court for a significant amount of time.

The playing time and scoring responsibilities are now in the hands of a new group of seniors including Scott Bumb, Mike McKone and Breckin Kleinsasser. Bumb is averaging 12.6 points an outing and the 6-foot-6 center scored seven against the Red Wolves due to limited playtime brought on by the score differential.

Bumb is the son of former University of Arizona volleyball standout Beth Raymond Bumb and he is stepping into the spot vacated by Elliott, the nephew of Sean Elliott.

The Lions led 15-8 after one and 27-14 at the half and slowly pulled away from there. Kleinsasser scored eight points and junior forward Tanner Rozon scored 11. The team poured in nine 3-pointers.

Walden Grove took Salpointe to the wire in a 68-67 loss to end the 2017 season but a 5-13 power-ranking record followed in 2018 and the program is winless in five tries this year. Chase Verdugo is now a freshman at Southern Utah and he left the Walden Grove program with 1,492 career points. His older brother, Conner Verdugo, scored 1,807 for the Red Wolves and he moved on to Embry-Riddle. It’s proven to be a bit difficult to replace the pair in the scoring column.

Not only did Chase Verdugo take his 24.9 points with him, Dominic Romero (14.1) and Alastair Pardi (13.4) also graduated. It’ a very young squad. Freshman Eli Green scored nine points to lead Walden Grove and junior Mason Miller added six.

The Red Wolves will travel to Cholla (4-1) Friday night and the team is slated to take part in the North Valley Christian Shootout over the winter break. Pusch Ridge hosts Flowing Wells Friday night and lot of eyes will be on Khalid Whitaker as he draws near to 1,000 career points for the Caballeros.

The Lions will be playing in the Chandler Prep New Years Classic over the break.