Jake Karnish enjoys a grand night as Fleetwood pounds Upper Perk

Jake Karnish wasted little time reaching a career scoring milestone Tuesday, scoring 14 first-quarter points in Fleetwood’s 62-29 win over Upper Perkiomen in the Tiger Classic.

Karnish, the Berks Conference’s leading scorer, needed just four points to reach 1,000. He scored six baskets in the first quarter as part of a 32-point Fleetwood outburst.

Karnish finished with a game-high 22 points, giving him 1,018 in his four seasons.

He is just the fifth player in program history to reach 1,000 points and the first since 1983, when both Dave Angstadt (1,201) and Jeff Batturs (1,162) reached the milestone.

Dave Smith finished with 1,176 points in 1964. Arlan Burkert was the Tigers’ first 1,000-point scorer, in 1957, when he led the team to its first of four District 3 titles and its only PIAA championship.

Aiden Soumas had 17 points Tuesday and Kevin Williams had 14 as the Tigers built a 44-15 lead against the Indians (1-7).

Fleetwood plays Brandywine Heights Wednesday on the second day of the Tiger Classic. Because one of the original teams in the tournament dropped out there are only three teams; they’re playing a round-robin rather than a standard two-round tournament. Brandywine plays Upper Perkiomen on Thursday.

Karnish was named MVP of the York Suburban Tip-Off Tournament, where he scored 30 points in a 63-41 win over Bishop McDevitt and a career-high 33 in a 62-44 win over Red Land.

Karnish has scored 22 or more points in each of the Tigers’ seven games.

Last season Karnish was an All-Berks pick as a junior, Fleetwood’s first in more than 30 years. He averaged a team-leading 17.2 points per game.

He averaged a team-high 13.9 points as a sophomore and 7.7 points as a freshman, when he played in all 21 games and was third on the team in scoring.

Karnish’s season-high had been 30 points, last year in a 54-49 win over Schuylkill Valley. He had 20 or more points seven other times last season as Fleetwood went 16-8 and won the Berks III title, its first outright division title in more than 40 years.

Karnish has offers to play at Wilkes, Elizabethtown and DeSales.