Eudora ? The Veritas Christian boys basketball team will remember it as the night Marcus Holman threw down the first dunk in the program’s three-year history.

However, the more important memory from Friday night’s rematch with Olathe Christian shouldn’t be that it happened, but instead how it happened.

Eagles coach Doug Bennett has taken on the sound of a broken record this winter in his effort to convince his squad the road to glory is a high-speed expressway of up-tempo basketball. Life certainly looked good in the fast lane against the Warriors, as Veritas converted on a number of easy looks to secure a 72-58 victory at the Eudora Community Learning Center.

“He’s been telling us to do it all year, but we haven’t been doing it until recently,” said Veritas forward Andrew Bartlow, who finished with 13 points.

Instead, Veritas has been content to pound the ball inside to center Mark Randtke, the city’s leading scorer at 19.2 ppg. The 6-foot-5 senior was at it again Friday, scoring a game-high 29.

However, he was simply the steady recipient of the speedy work taking place in the Eagles’ backcourt.

Holman repeatedly torched Olathe Christian’s three-quarter-court pressure, using an assortment of coast-to-coast lay-ups and the aforementioned dunk to score 17 points. His running mate, Casey Woods, also chipped in eight – numbers that fall more in line with what Bennett envisioned heading into this season.

“We weren’t getting much out of our guards,” said Bennett, reflecting on the first half of the current campaign. “The up-tempo game has been a big plus to getting them points.”

“It’s a lot more fun for the kids to play that style of game,” added Bennett. “It’s a lot more exciting for everyone.”

Sometimes too exciting. Up 18 points early in the fourth quarter, Veritas (10-7) struggled to balance its newfound aggressive nature with intelligent late-game execution. A combination of rushed shots and turnovers allowed the Warriors to cut the margin to eight with 4:19 remaining before Randtke and Holman combined on a 6-0 run to ease any remaining concerns.

Olathe Christian 56, Veritas girls 44

Olathe freshman Leah Cotton already is receiving letters of interest from a handful of NCAA Division I schools.

She showed why against the Eagles, scoring 17 of her team’s 22 fourth-quarter points as the Warriors blew open a tight contest during the final eight minutes.

After doing much of her early damage in the paint, the 5-9 Cotton ran Olathe Christian’s offense from the point come crunch time, repeatedly beating her defender and creating point-blank opportunities for herself and her teammates. She finished with a game-high 36 points.

“When they spread us and she penetrated, they went on that 10- or 12-point run. That just did us in,” said Veritas coach Kevin Shelton.

“When you play them, you know you’ve got to stop Leah. … She does that to a lot of teams.”

While the Eagles (7-9) had greater balance – sophomores Kristie Tiegreen and Adi Willems tied for team-high honors with 13 points apiece – they weren’t proficient, shooting just 31 percent from the floor while amassing 24 turnovers.