The winning streak continues after last week's 53-45 victory at Clinton Central. In a game that saw the Oracles continue to shoot lights out from the field, the Delphi boy's basketball team won its fifth game-in-a row for the first time since it won six straight during the 2003-04 season. That was the season that the Oracles played for a Regional championship, won a Sectional title and finished with the school's last winning record of 17-8.

Although this year's edition has not yet enjoyed as much success, it does appear to be heading into tournament play finally clicking on most all cylinders.

Once again, the Oracles set new standards for the season in both shooting percentage overall (.692 percent on 18-of-26) and from inside the arc (.714 percent, 15-of-21), while continuing to light it up from three-point range at .600 percent (3-of-5) and distributing the ball to get layups and open shots (14 assists on 18 made baskets).

It marked the fourth straight game in which Delphi has shot above .559 percent from the field overall and the sixth-in-arow in which it has shot at least .435 or better, which appears to be a measuring point for this team.

Dating to last year, all 13 Oracle wins have come when they have shot at least .435 overall from the field, while they are 0-20 during the same span when failing to at least shoot at that mark.

They have lost eight times over the last two seasons when shooting .435 percent or below, but as much as stats can lie, this trend seems to be an indicator of the team's success.

"We shot the ball very well once again," head coach Brian Tonsoni said. "We were very patient and attacked the lane for easy points."

One area that was not as strong but has been during the winning streak is free throw shooting. The Oracles were an abysmal .519 percent (14-of- 27) after shooting a combined 26-of-30 (.867 percent) in its last two wins.

Delphi (7-13) never trailed against the Bulldogs after Austin Hawn pulled up for a three-pointer from the top of the key on the Oracles first possession, setting the offensive tone early. The Oracles led 9-6 at the end of the first period along with baskets by Kris Bender, Tanner Cripe and Justin Snider.

Clinton Central (3-17) would only get as close as one point on two occasions the rest of the way, after scoring the first bucket of the second period to make it 9-8, then hitting two foul shots after a Bender hoop made it 11-10 at the 5:08 mark. Hawn then nailed backto back three-pointers to extend the lead to a first half-high of seven points at 17-10, forcing a Bulldog timeout with 4:27 remaining in the half.

The Bulldogs came out of the timeout with a familiar defensive adjustment - "shadowing" and "face-guarding" Hawn for the rest of the game in order to try and limit his touches. But once again the strategy backfired as the rest of the Oracles picked it up at the offensive end, as they have each game during the winning stretch when the opposition switches into a "gimmick" defense.

Bender hit three free throws to close the half and allowed the Oracles to hold onto a 20- 16 lead at halftime.

Delphi then began methodically extending its lead, to 38- 25 after a Paul Zink basket to end the third quarter, then to a game-high 16 points at 41-25 after a Zink free throw and a Bender bucket to open the final period.

But Clinton Central hit consecutive three-pointers to cut it to 41-31 at the 3:52 mark and continued to cut away to get within six at 48-42 with 40 seconds left. The Oracles struggled mightily from the foul line, at one point missing 10-of-13 free throws. Bender nailed two at the 34.7 second mark to help clinch it.

Bender led another balanced attack with 13 points, followed by Hawn with 11 points and a team-high 6 boards, Zink with 9 points, Cripe with 7, Snider 5, Jordan Wagner 4 and Dustin Salyer and Matt Brown with 2 apiece.

"We had a 16 point lead in the fourth quarter and let up some," Tonsoni said. "That is not acceptable; we need to learn to put people away when ahead in the fourth."

"But I am very proud of these men and their ability to handle adversity and turn the year around," he added.

Delphi now sets its sights on the Class 2A Sectional back in Michigantown, waiting to face the Carroll-Fountain Central winner from Tuesday night (played too late for inclusion in this week's Comet) in Friday night's semi-final round slated to begin at 7:30 p.m., immediately following the Seeger- Clinton Central game at 6 p.m.

Saturday night's Sectional 37 championship game is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m.

BROADCAST-SPORT.NET will be doing a live feed from Clinton Central for Carroll and Delphi games throughout the boys basketball sectional. The Internet address is www. broadcastsport.net.

JV wins, finishes 9-11

The Delphi JV team also capped off its season with a 57-53 overtime victory over the Bulldogs. The Oracles used some timely three-point shooting from both Ethan Ross and Cole Whitaker and some clutch free throws by Tyler Smith to end the season on a high note.

Ross nailed four treys and Whitaker added one, along with 6-of-8 overall shooting from the field, while Smith finished 10-of-12 from the charity stripe to lead Delphi with 14 points apiece.

Benoit Gafford added 6 points and a game-high 10 rebounds, while Nick Zink had 6 points, a game-high 4 steals and 6 boards, Zach Condon added 2 points and 7 rebounds and Cody Lohrman had a point.