PEYTON – Kaleb Chapin took the floor for his third varsity start of the season having scored a total of 30 points.

He was focused on positioning and defense. Move the ball when you get it, shoot if the rare opportunity presents itself.

Turned out, shooting opportunities weren’t all that rare for Chapin.

Chapin scored a career-high 19 points, leading Class 3A Manitou Springs to a comfortable win over 2A Peyton 73-49 on Saturday at Peyton High School.

“Warmups didn’t feel great,” Chapin said. “But when I came out I just felt good and they kept going in.”

Chapin earned his first two points on his own, stealing the ball and racing to the basket to put Pikes Peak region 3A and below No. 2 Manitou Springs (11-0) up 20-7 with 45 seconds left in the first quarter.

An inauspicious beginning for sure. But then came the second quarter and Chapin drained three of his game-high five 3-pointers. (He shot 100 percent from behind the arc.) He hit his other two in the third quarter before sitting out the fourth like a seasoned vet who had put in plenty of work.

“It’s only my third start this year, so I was just focusing on playing hard, trying to leave everything out there,” Chapin said. “I just wanted to focus on my defensive effort, make sure we spread the ball, everybody got a touch on the ball.”

Filling in for Jared Keul, Chapin showed coach Ken Vecchio that the Mustangs have another scoring option off the bench.

“We’re going to need that,” Vecchio said. “Whether it be somebody else getting sick, or somebody getting hurt or somebody getting in foul trouble, we’re going to need that extra perimeter guy. If we can get that effort out of him, we’re going to need it a ton.”

The Mustangs built the big first quarter behind their defense. They forced six turnovers in the quarter, scoring seven points off them.

“Defense is huge with our team,” said Lucas Rodholm, who finished with 17 points for the Mustangs, ranked No. 2 entering the day in RPI. “Anytime we can hold a team lower than 50, with how we score, we’re pretty much going to win the game.”

The game came at the right time for the 10-1 Panthers, Peyton coach Jedd Sims said.

“I think there was a comfortability factor, even in practices we’ve seen it getting there,” Sims said. “So I think what this does is remind us we’ve got to get back to working hard, we need to get back to the fundamentals.

“We thought maybe if we sat in a zone and they were off a little bit in their shooting it would keep us competitive,” said Sims, whose Panthers dropped three spots in the RPI to No. 12 despite going 2-0 since the original rankings were posted Wednesday. “But some of their role players, some of their second-tier guys shot the snot out of the basketball tonight.”

While Peyton came out with renewed energy to start the second half, every time the Panthers went on a run, Manitou had an answer.

A 10-2 run late in the third quarter by the Panthers was cut short when Rodholm kicked out to Chapin, who drained his final 3 to put the Mustangs up 56-33.

Gage Gellerman led the Panthers with 14 points.

“They’re a phenomenal team,” Sims said of the Mustangs. “I think they’re a championship team.”