Emporia ? It was 99 seconds of hell, to be blunt.

Lawrence High’s boys basketball team just wouldn’t go away in the first half against a run-and-gun group from Wichita East, but the Aces pulled away with a paralyzing 12-0 spurt right out of the gates in the second half.

Players on the Lawrence high bench, from left, Kristian Pope, Tony Anderson, David Freeman and Brennan Bechard, are lost in their thoughts during the final minutes of their loss. The Lions fell to Wichita East, 91-66, Wednesday in Emporia.

The rest was just details as the Lions were unable to advance out of the first round at the Class 6A state tournament, falling 91-66 Wednesday night.

“The things we tried to do defensively really didn’t work,” LHS coach Chris Davis said. “We tried to take away the middle, and they hit from the perimeter. And the minute we came out to the perimeter, they hit from the middle. I don’t know what to say other than that they’re a heck of a basketball team and they’ll probably do pretty well.”

In the first meeting between the two teams, East blew out Lawrence thanks to a 31-13 first-quarter run. Lawrence showed early that it could hang with the quick and deep Aces. Wednesday’s game was the complete opposite of the Lions’ sub-state championship victory to make it to Emporia, which came against a slow-down attack provided by Olathe North.

LHS seniors Brennan Bechard and Tony Anderson helped the Lions stay close to the Aces early. Anderson scored eight of his 10 points in the first quarter, including a sweet behind-the-back dish from Bechard on a fast break to pull Lawrence within two at 13-11.

But Wichita East showed early and often that it could do a little bit of everything.

Senior forward Carlin Whitten was an unstoppable tank in the middle, senior guards Sammie Fisher and A.J. Allen were stroking from the outside, and senior guard Joe Wheeler was penetrating the holes in the LHS defense to get easy looks.

When the blue and white tornado left White Auditorium, six players had scored in double figures for the Aces, led by Whitten’s 20 and 19 from Wheeler.

Lawrence High's Kristian Pope is surrounded by Wichita East's Anthony Allen, left, and Carlin Whitten in the first half. The Lions endured a 91-66 whipping by the Aces in their Class 6A state tournament first-round game Wednesday night in Emporia.

“In your mind, you’re like, ‘I gotta recover from this,'” LHS senior guard David Freeman said of East’s relentless scoring spurts. “You just can’t do that all game.”

But give LHS credit as the seniors fought back in the third quarter. Bechard led the Lions with 19 points, including 10 in the third quarter, but for good measure, Wichita East had a 16-4 run to start the fourth, putting the game in the books for good.

In the end, Lawrence turned the ball over 21 times, feeding the Wichita East fast-break monster, which was running smoothly the entire 32 minutes. Even when the Aces’ looks at the hoop weren’t clean, just about everything seemed to fall. They shot just under 53 percent from the floor.

6Sports video: Lions fall to Wichita East Photo Gallery: LHS vs. Wichita East

It made for a second bitter ending for a group of five seniors from Lawrence in just under eight hours — Free State High’s season ended earlier in Emporia — and the LHS veterans watched the waning seconds from the bench gathering their tears and thoughts.

“We thought we made some pretty good changes at halftime, and then it was just that two or three things went their way, and the next thing you knew, we were deflated,” Davis said. “It made it emotionally difficult to continue to play.”