photos by Charlie McDonald (charlie.mcdonald@surewestsports.com)
By Mike Finnerty (mike.finnerty@surewestsports.com)
It was the area's top two teams going at it Friday night in a Delta River League battle for supremacy.
The No. 1 Sheldon Huskies (18-4, 6-1) took on the No. 2 Jesuit Marauders (19-5, 5-2) in front of a near capacity crowd at Sheldon High School that would end in dramatics when Sheldon's Kyi Thomas (17 points) scored on a tip-in with three seconds left to give Sheldon a 71-70 victory over Jesuit.
Before the Thomas tip-in, Jesuit's Bryce Pressley, who had a game-high 22 points, drilled a corner three to go up 70-69 with eight seconds left.
Sheldon's Armani Hampton (11 points) then took the inbounds pass, quickly pushed the ball all the way up the court, missed a runner in the lane that went went off the front of the iron, and that's when Thomas was there for the game-winner.
"I'm feeling great, I'm thrilled, I'm excited, I'm just happy it went in," said Thomas. "I saw that Armani was driving to the basket, he had that tunnel vision, so I was like I'm gonna go follow this shot, see if I can rebound and put it back if he misses the shot and that's what happened."
For Sheldon head coach Joey Rollings, it looked as though Jesuit was going to win it.
"I thought when they hit that three it was done with. Armani attacked the basket liked we should, we got the ball in there, they're celebrating, he got a good shot up off the glass and Kyi followed, and Kyi with that vertical tipped it in, so it was a good win for us," said Rollings.
The game was a rematch of the January 13 showdown where Sheldon beat Jesuit 88-70, but this time around Jesuit battled in the second half and made it a game.
Down 35-30 the the break, the Marauders rallied behind the play of Akachi Okugo (17 points) who hit three, 3-pointers in the quarter, Brian Glodowsi and Parker Uu (14 points) hit several big shots as well, but trailed 52-50 heading to the fourth.
Jesuit caught fire in the fourth as well with a 12-0 run giving the Marauders their biggest lead of the game at 65-58 with 3:38 left to play. Big shots by Pressley and Parker Uu helped lead the rally as momentum had cleared shifted in favor of Jesuit.
"We just weren't getting the calls our way. We were pushing the ball, we were forcing shots at that time. I told them to slow down, tighten up the defense a little bit, take better shots, and we started attacking the basket. Armani got a good three for us to get us back in the rhythm of things, we got a transition lay up for us, so that got all the wheels turning for us."
Sheldon answered with an 11-0 run putting the Huskies up 69-65 with 48 seconds remaining.
A tip-in by Jesuit's Brian Glodowski cut the lead to two before Pressley's three and Thomas' game winner capped off a frantic and furious final minute of the game.
The win now gives Sheldon a two-game lead over second place Jesuit with three games left to play in the Delta River League, making this a critical victory for the Huskies.
Sheldon's D'erryl Williams added 13 points.
"Anytime you beat Jesuit its a solid win," said Rollings.
Perhaps Thomas said it best when summarizing the win, "Basketball is a game of runs, we ended up finishing out with the last run, that's pretty good."