LAKEWOOD — The Cougars learned a valuable lesson they’ll need in the playoffs this season — how to close games.

Lakewood took a 35-27 lead into the fourth quarter against King’s, but a few miscues on defense and special teams led to a 46-43 Knights victory Oct. 9.

“It was a rough one to lose because we did a lot of things right, but we let it slip away,” said Lakewood coach Dan Teeter.

A matchup billed to feature Division 1 prospect quarterbacks Justin Lane of Lakewood and Thomas Vincent of King’s lived up to the hype, despite the Cougars’ game plan to the contrary.

“We didn’t want it to be Lane vs. Vincent,” said Teeter. “We wanted to prove that we were the better team, so we didn’t throw the ball once on the first drive and scored.”

The Cougars rode backs Christian Melton and Donovan Evans early, who each scored in the first quarter as the Cougars had a 14-13 lead.

Meanwhile Vincent ran wild, scoring four rushing touchdowns in the first half and helping King’s to a 27-21 lead at halftime.

“This was exactly where we wanted to be at halftime because we planned on just wearing them out in the second half,” said Teeter.

And that looked to be the case, as Lakewood continued to run the ball, gaining 285 yards rushing for the game and Brandon Stott scoring on an 8-yard run to retake the lead.

Lakewood scored again on a 5-yard pass from Lane to Dustin Stanton.

King’s responded with three touchdowns in roughly four minutes from an interception and recovering a kickoff due to Lakewood miscommunication.

Melton scored his second touchdown of the night on a 1-yard run, but the Cougars could not complete the comeback. Melton finished with 89 yards on 17 carries while Evans had 117 yards on seven carries.

On King’s side, almost every play went through Vincent’s hands, as he completed 20 of 26 passes for 212 yards and two TDs, but scored another four on the ground, rushing 33 times for 184 yards.

Lane finished completing 15 of 20 pass attempts for 167 yards and two scores. He also rushed for 64 yards.

Lakewood drops to 4-2 overall and 2-2 in the Cascade Conference.