NEW ULM — New Ulm Eagles head boys basketball coach Matthew Dennis said that despite his teams’ 3-13 season record, he has seen progress.

Thursday night, his team took another positive step.

The Eagles jumped out to a 50-32 halftime lead and went on to down Jordan 86-82 Thursday night in a nonconference boys basketball.

Zach Hubbard led New Ulm (4-13) with 29 points. Mitchell Hopp added 18 and Levi Hopp ended with 15.

Lexyn Grof led Jordan (11-5) with 30 points.

“We showed what we can do when we play as a team,” Dennis said. “When we move the ball — when we make the extra pass and when we defend. Our first half defense was really, really strong for us and we turned defense into offense.”

And that first half defense for the Eagles may have been the difference in the game.

The Eagles, who host TCU Friday night at 8 p.m.in a Big South Conference game, built a 24-13 lead at the 5:54 mark of the first half on a 3 from Levi Hopp and an Owen Castleman basket off of one of 13 Hubmen first-half turnovers that resulted in 12 New Ulm points.

“We found open guys and theo open guys hit shots,” Dennis added. “We played with a lot of passion — they had to burn two timeouts because of the turnovers. We caused some havoc.”

Hubbard led the Eagles 50 point first half output with 18 of his 29 game points.

“He was huge tonight,” Dennis said about the 6-foot 1 junior. “When we needed a slasher — he was there catching and finishing at the rim. He knocked down some big shots.”

New Ulm built on that first half lead to 64-44 in the second half before Jordan slowly got back into the game cutting the lead to 81-77 with 54 seconds left in the game.

But four free throws from Levi Hopp and a charity shot from Mitchell Hopp sealed the deal for the win

“Credit to our kids for being so engaged and so believing in what we are doing — it was a fun night,” Dennis said.