Extracurricular activities are an extension of the classroom.

Educators say that all of the time.

So do coaches and the basketball court at New Haven High School played the part of a classroom Saturday night.

A lot of learning was going on in the championship game of the holiday tournament hosted by the Rockets.

Visiting Armada out-scored New Haven 41-10 in the second half and wound up taking home the trophy following a 68-28 victory.

The win puts the undefeated Armada Tigers at 6-0. New Haven fell to 2-4.

“This was probably our most physical game,” said John Baerwolf, the coach at Armada. “We’ve been trying to play up tempo this year, but the physical part of the game is something we hadn’t had before this game. It was a little chippy out there. A tough, hard-fought game was kind of nice to have, to be honest with you. The final score was not indicative of how competitive this game was.”

So his Armada Tigers learned the physicality can be part of the game. They responded well, especially in the second half.

Armada led at halftime 27-18.

“At halftime, I told the players to fight through it and not worry about officiating. They had to focus on the game. All of our players did that,” said Baerwolf.

Junior Caitlin Rawlins scored 19 points, had six steals and four assists to help lead the Tigers to victory. Junior Madelynne Sutton scored 16, grabbed four rebounds and had two steals. Senior captain Sara Lesnesky finished with 14 points and nine rebounds.

“You could see Sara Lesnesky get into a different mind frame. She decided she was getting the ball and nobody else was going to take it from her. Caitlin Rawlins picked it up on the defensive end. She put a lot of pressure on New Haven. Our second-half response started with those two.”

Among Lesnesky’s 14 points was a chamois soft three-pointer in the second half that slipped through the net.

“The 3 was the best,” said Lesnesky, smiling. “I hesitated for a split second before I shot, but I worked so much on shooting 3’s during the off-season that they are going to be a part of my game this year. Shooting them is more natural than it has ever been before.”

Latwan Turner is the coach at New Haven. He knows there was much to learn in Saturday night’s defeat.

“Armada is a very tough team. They never lost their composure. We hung in there early, but Armada never got rattled. Down the stretch, they forced a lot of turnovers,” said Turner.

“We have to learn how to raise our level of play. The girls have not reached that point yet. We are going to take this game and use it as a learning tool. It will definitely help us in league play,” continued the New Haven coach.

Raychael Banks scored 11 for the Rockets. Savanna Wade added six points.

New Haven is 1-0 in MAC Bronze play. The Rockets welcome Eastpointe on Friday, Jan. 12, for a division game.

Armada travels to Yale Friday, Jan. 5, for a BWAC confrontation.