It was the one that got away. To be more fair, North East took it. The Rising Sun boys basketball team was unable to complete a regular season sweep of North East as the Indians staged a fourth-quarter rally and went on to top the Tigers 53-51 in overtime Friday night. It was a ragged game for the first three quarters but that was mostly forgotten because of the dramatic finish.
"We left it all out on the court," Rising Sun coach Don Passenant said. "We were on the wrong side of the score. I can't really complain about the guys. I got to hand it to [Indians coach] Dave [Huff] and North East for making a big comeback. We were up by 10. We had plenty of opportunities to push it further. It just didn't happen. And they did one heck of a job coming back." The host Indians battled back from an eight-point fourth quarter deficit and led 40-37 with 14.4 seconds left. North East missed the front end of a one-and-one and Rising Sun rebounded and took a timeout with 8.1 seconds to go. That's when Casey Baker, who had been forgotten while the play was being designed, came through with a clutch shot. The Tigers got the ball to Baker on the right wing. Two North East defenders were draped all over him but Baker rose up and buried a three-pointer to tie the score. "He was supposed to go in the corner," Passenant said. "Sometimes when I set up a play I forget the fifth guy. Casey said, 'What do I do?' I said, "Casey, I want you right in this corner and you just sprint to the other side.' And that's what happened. He got the shot." After an Indians' timeout, Rising Sun's Kevin Alkinburg intercepted the ensuing inbounds pass to force overtime. On the heels of Baker's huge shot, the Tigers seemed to have the momentum. And North East entered overtime without leading scorer Garren Davidson, who fouled out with 1:27 remaining in regulation. "[Davidson] fouling out was good. It was great," Passenant said. "But we needed to dump it inside and we didn't do it. Their man-to-man was excellent. They were switching on it and our guys didn't react fast enough and we couldn't get it inside. When Davidson went out, I was like, 'Oh, good', but at the same time I'm thinking, it doesn't matter. We still have to stop them." Rising Sun's Brennan Martz scored the first basket of overtime on a putback, but that would turn out to be the Tigers' only lead in the extra session. Bryan Rawls tied it and Jake Cyran put the Indians ahead for good with a three-pointer from the top of the key. It was North East's final field goal of the game but the Indians made enough free throws to secure the win. Cyran added a pair of free throws to up the Indians' advantage to 47-42 with 2:13 left in OT. North East's lead vacillated between five and three until Alkinburg scored to trim the margin to 50-48 with 41 ticks left. The Indians made three of six free throw attempts to extend their lead to 53-48 before the Tigers' Noah Juergens nailed a three-pointer at the buzzer to account for the final score. Cyran and Davidson each scored 12 points. Lane Schmidt and Marcus Johnson both added 11. Alkinburg paced the Tigers with 15 points, 13 rebounds, eight blocks, and three steals. Juergens finished with 12 points. Martz added 11 points, five rebounds, and four steals. For the first three quarters, there was no indication the contest would have an exciting conclusion. Rising Sun scored the first six points and led 6-2 at the end of the first quarter. The Tigers were ahead 21-12 at halftime and 30-22 at the end of the third quarter. After scoring 22 points in the first 24 minutes, North East tallied 31 points in the final 12 minutes including the fourth quarter and the four-minute overtime period. Comments are closed.
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