Thomas Booker poured in a game-high 25 points to help lead East Nashville to a 59-48 District 10-AA win over visiting Pearl-Cohn Tuesday night.

“Thomas is the best player in town,” East Nashville coach Jim Fey said.

“Some shots you’re not always a fan of, but he was on and when he’s on we’re going to roll with him.”

The first quarter was a tight back-and-forth affair until Booker put in nine straight points, and Toree McGhee added his second 3-pointer of the quarter to put East Nashville up 17-11.

“Thomas had a great night; the kid is phenomenal,” Pearl-Cohn coach Raymond Pratcher said. “We tried to throw different things at him but he just made shots.”

East Nashville (22-2, 10-1) used a physical second quarter to extend its lead over Pearl-Cohn (16-6, 8-3) and take a 30-20 advantage into halftime.

Pearl-Cohn got plenty of good looks in the first half but was unable to convert on a lot of open shots.

“Cold night for our guys,” Pratcher said. “I was hoping that we would be able to bounce out of it and take more high-percentage shots but we didn’t shoot the ball very well.”

The Eagles limited Pearl-Cohn to just four points in the third quarter and used a 10-point outburst by Booker to end the third ahead of the Firebirds 43-24.

The Firebirds ended the game on a 10-2 run when it was all but over.

“We had a lot of mental errors,” Pratcher said.

“We should have rebounded the ball better and that’s something that we have got to fix.”

Despite the win, Fey said he was disappointed in his team’s ability to close out a game.

“We let some things go at the end that we should have done a better job with,” Fey said. “We make a stop on defense, have a 20-point lead and next thing you know we throw the ball away and give them more opportunities.”

Reach Sam Brown at 615-259-8232 or on Twitter @SamBrownTN.