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With a strong finish, the Rockbridge County High School boys basketball team earned a 40-33 overtime win at home over Valley District rival Turner Ashby on Tuesday of last week in Lexington.
The Wildcats (7-9 overall, 2-2 district) followed that effort with a 55-49 district road loss to Broadway on Friday.
On a night when neither team shot well, the Wildcats and TA were tied 30-30 at the end of regulation, but RC outscored the Knights 10-3 in overtime, with Matthew Burkhart and Henry Lambert making key free throws in the final stretch. TA ended the week at 3-13 overall and 0-4 in the district.
Burkhart scored five of his nine points in overtime, while Lambert scored three of his five points in the extra period. Lambert led RC with six rebounds and had one block, while Burkhart had two steals. Keaton Owsley came off the bench to contribute nine points, five rebounds, a steal and a block for the Wildcats.
Proud of Owsley’s effort, RC head coach Rob Winfield said, “What Keaton does is he puts the ball in the basket. That’s what his specialty is.
He’s going to put the ball on the floor, preferably two dribbles, and he’s gonna look to score.”
Relieved his team got back in the win column after a 70-50 district home loss to Spotswood four days earlier, Winfield said, “It was one of those nights where you’ve just got to scratch and claw and find it some way. I don’t know, offensively, if anybody played great. We had open shots. We just didn’t make them.”
Milo Mulitalo scored six points and pulled down five boards for RC while Andreas Poindexter chipped in five points, all in the first quarter, and took two charges. Brandon Mays added four points and three steals and the Wildcats got strong defense from Daronde’ Stores, who made two steals. Lincoln Hundley chipped in two points and grabbed three rebounds.
Early in the game, the Wildcats jumped out to a 9-2 lead, but the Knights went on a 6-0 run to cut it to 9-8 by the end of the first quarter.
In the second quarter, TA took its first lead of the game when Beau Baylor hit a 3-pointer to put the Knights up 17-15. Baylor made another 3-pointer moments later, helping TA take a 20-19 lead into halftime. For the game, Baylor led all players with 14 points, 12 of them in the first half, and was the only double-digit scorer in the game.
Neither team could get its offense going in the third quarter, as TA outscored RC 5-2 and took a 24-21 lead into the fourth quarter.
From late in the third quarter through about two minutes into the fourth quarter, the Knights went on an 8-0 run to go up 30-21. Owsley finally stopped that run by making an inside basket and then a pull-up jumper. He then made a three-point play to cut TA’s lead to 30-28 with 3:19 left.
It was a defensive battle for the rest of regulation, with Burkhart tying the game at 30-30 by making an inside basket on an assist from Mulitalo with 1:07 left. The score remained the same until overtime.
In OT, Burkhart hit a jump shot on RC’s first possession, but TA’s Nolan Bailey tied the game at 32-32 with an inside basket. Mays then scored on an inside basket, and the Wildcats limited TA to one free throw for the rest of the game, as Lambert and Mays executed from the line.
Other than Baylor, TA’s leaders were Micah Shank with six points, Jack Fox with five points, and Bailey with four points and seven rebounds.
Winfield said the Knights did a good job on defense in the second half, putting a double team on Mulitalo and holding the starting RC center, who scored six points in the first half, scoreless in the second half. “I don’t know that Milo has honestly seen many double teams,” said Winfield. “That’s something he’s got to work on and we’ve got to work on.”
TA committed 16 turnovers while the Wildcats had nine turnovers.
Reviewing the night, Winfield said, “We scored two points in the third quarter, and we found a way to win. To me, that’s what improving teams do, and we’re getting better every day.”
After winning several close games over the last few weeks, the Wildcats suffered a 55-49 road loss to district rival Broadway on Friday.
The Gobblers (9-7, 3-0) jumped out to a 16-9 lead after the first quarter and extended their advantage to double digits in the second quarter. The Wildcats cut the lead to four points in the third quarter, but Broadway maintained a small advantage throughout the second half to hold off the Wildcats.
“They’re a very good team,” said Winfield of the Gobblers, noting that teams are very close in the regional standings.
“I thought we did a lot of things really well,” added Winfield. “It was a close game, but we didn’t do enough of the little things that we needed to do to win.”
Mulitalo led RC’s offense, scoring 16 points. “We had an advantage inside, and Milo did a good job attacking them,” said Winfield.
Mays scored 11 points for the Wildcats while Owsley added eight and Burkhart chipped in six.
For Broadway, Tristan Yoder got the offense going early, making several baskets in the first quarter, and Braden Burkhalter hit a huge 3-pointer in the second half to give the Gobblers momentum. Yoder led the Gobblers with 14 points while Burkhalter added 12 points.
The Wildcats were slated to play at Harrisonburg last night. In a varsity game on Friday night, the Wildcats are scheduled to play host to Stuarts Draft at 8:30 p.m. in the ninth annual Rock the Ribbon Roundball Shootout. RC will return to district action at Spotswood on Tuesday, starting with junior varsity action at 5:30 p.m.
