In front of a packed gym, the Central Cyclones showed why they’re one of the best teams in the province on Tuesday night.

The Cyclones used a consistent attack throughout the contest to score a 96-61 win over the rival Peacock Toilers, improving to 7-0 in the Moose Jaw High School Senior Boys Basketball League.

Peacock drops to 4-2 with the loss.

“It felt really good, we came out way better in the third quarter and it all started with defence,” said Central post Jaxson Brownell. “We started playing hard on defence, then we start running and getting open layups, then we start shooting threes and that’s what gets us going.”

The game was tight in the early going with Central holding a 24-22 lead after a back-and-forth first quarter. The Cyclones started to pull away during the second quarter, extending their lead to 52-39 at halftime.

Central’s depth ended up being too much for Peacock in the second half as the Cyclones held the Toilers to just seven points in the third quarter and 22 points overall in the final 20 minutes.

“Central runs, they play hard for the whole 40 minutes and that’s their game plan is to wear you down and they did a good job of that tonight, their guys played hard the whole way and we ran out of bodies and energy,” said Peacock head coach Troy Setter.

“You always need to make adjustments after playing Central, they’re a strong team, they’re well coached, they have great athletes and they’re number one in the province for the reason.”

The Cyclones have had a lot of success throughout the season, but with the playoffs on the horizon in the next few weeks, Brownell said this can be a big momentum building victory for Central.

“This is a big booster and hopefully we can carry the momentum through the rest of the season,” he said.

Brownell had seven points and pulled down some key rebounds throughout the game for Central.

The Cyclones had five players hit double digits in the win, led by 21 points from Fharis Ebet. Ethan Johnson added 19 points, while Riley Seaborn and Kyle Boughen had 14 points each.

Peacock was led by Spencer Adams’ 11 points, while Shae Zwozdesky chipped in with 10.

The Toilers will be back on the court on Thursday for another big game against the Vanier Vikings, who are coming off a 90-77 win over the Caronport Cougars during Tuesday’s action. Ronald Nyekowat had a game-high 35 points in that win for Vanier, while Jude Shepherd-Hills scored 33 points in the loss for Caronport. The win improves Vanier to 4-3 on the year, while Caronport falls to 1-5.

Peacock and Vanier tip-off at 8 p.m. on Thursday. Next action for Central is on Feb. 27 when they host the Assiniboia Rockets.