Leavenworth ? Free State High junior center Keith Wooden hasn’t seen a lot of man-to-man defense this year.

Leavenworth High tried it and paid the price in a 74-63 Free State victory on Saturday.

Most teams won’t force one player to try and defend the Division I prospect, but Leavenworth High did Friday and paid the price in a 74-63 Free State victory.

Wooden scored a season-high 27 points, grabbed 12 rebounds and blocked three shots against the Pioneers.

“We’ve been playing against a diamond-and-one all year,” he said, “and this is the first time I’ve really got the chance to play against a man so I just wanted to go out there and prove myself.”

FSHS coach Jack Schreiner thought Wooden had met his goal.

“Probably, without question, this is the best game he’s played all year,” Schreiner said. “I thought he came to play. I thought he played hard, and he was really sick, too, so that’s what’s even better.”

Wooden scored the Firebirds’ first six points and nine of their first 14 in a first period that featured eight lead changes and three ties.

Even with Wooden’s heroics, Free State trailed 24-22 at the end of the period thanks to four Pioneers three-pointers.

Behind Wooden’s seven second-quarter points, the Firebirds gained a 37-34 halftime advantage as the Pioneers’ shooting prowess began to wane.

“I told my kids that we had to be feeling pretty good. They shot as well as they could possibly shoot and we’re up three at halftime,” Schreiner said. “I said that if they start shooting the ball like normal, we should be able to win this going away.”

As if they’d heard Schreiner’s halftime talk, the Pioneers scored just nine points in the third quarter on 4-of-15 shooting, and the Firebirds extended their lead to 56-43.

Leavenworth regained its hot hand for a while, though, closing the deficit to six points with just under a minute remaining, but Free State made six of its final 10 free throws to seal Schreiner’s first victory in the Leavenworth gym.

“I told the kids that and that was huge for us,” Schreiner said. “We beat a good, fundamentally solid team and I feel real good about this one.”

Leavenworth girls 57, Free State 38

Free State held Leavenworth to 31 percent shooting, but were outrebounded 35-18 by the Pioneers, who scored 24 second-chance points.

“I thought we allowed them too many second shots early in the first half,” FSHS coach Craig Hershiser said, “and later we did a little bit better job of blocking out and contesting on the boards but still, their effort on the backboards was probably a little bit better than ours and that helped a lot in terms of their victory.”

Lauren Wright, Free State’s leading scorer, went 1-of-15 from the field and 1-of-12 from behind the three-point line Saturday.

“Lauren had another tough shooting night,” Hershiser said. “That’ll happen. Shooters have a tough night and they just have to have the mentality that the next time they’re not going to.”

Stacie Garland led Free State with 12 points. Jamie Stanclift added 10 points and five rebounds.