By VINCE LOVERGINE
TopSports.news
Shawnee Heights boys basketball was in danger of letting a 25-point lead get away Tuesday night, but the T-Birds were able to hold off No. 7-ranked Piper in the final seconds for a 72-70 home United Kansas Conference victory.
JaiMarion Cook led Shawnee Heights with 25 points in Tuesday's 72-70 UKC win over Piper. [File photo/TSN]
The two programs have had their battles with one another over the last couple of years, especially in the state tournament, and Heights was able to snap a five-game losing streak to Piper.
“The first half was great and we were beating a great team by over 20 points,'' Shawnee Heights coach Ken Darting said. "We played great, but these guys get tired, missing free throws, turning the ball over, the shot comes up short. We can’t work any harder, I promise you, we just got to get more guys playing.''
Darting said the T-Birds currently have a small rotation and when they play a game like Tuesday's, players get gassed. Ja'Veon Alston started cramping and while freshman Quincy Dixon left the game after falling hard on his back drawing a foul early in the game.
“First half I thought we played great, we played as a team,'' Heights senior JaiMarion Cook said. "The whole season we’ve had a problem with closing games. Every game we’ve lost has come by single digits. We just got to learn how to stay poised as a team and I trusted in my teammates tonight and that’s why we got the win.''
Senior Aiden Scott scored the first seven points for SHHS after hitting a triple, putting them up 7-2. Piper would draw within one at 11-10 but that’s the closest they got for the remainder of the half.
Cook hit a 3-pointer with four seconds left in the first quarter off an assist from junior Cam Ross to put the T-Birds up 21-13.
Cook then took off, scoring 11 of the 13 points in the second quarter, while hitting two 3s, putting Heights up 27-17. About a minute later, off an offensive rebound, Alston put one off the window, forcing the Pirates into a timeout with 3:21 left in the half after Heights claimed its biggest lead, 29-17.
Cook went on to score five points down the stretch of the quarter, hitting three 3s in the right corner pocket, helping SHHS to an eight point lead at halftime, 34-26.
In the second half, Cook picked up where he left off, hitting another shot from distance to put the T-Birds in front 39-28 and Heights kept increasing its lead. Alston scored in transition off a turnover that caused Piper to call a timeout with 5:19 left in the third quarter.
The T-Birds got their lead up to 25, 57-32, after another Cook 3 and headed into the fourth quarter up 58-42.
But then the Pirates pressed, trapped and doubled teamed anytime they could to cut the deficit and they accomplished that goal, getting it down to a 60-52 game until Ross hit two free throws to put it back up to 10.
“For me it was how I can keep this team together?” Cook said. “How can I keep us all calm because we’ve been in these situations so many times and this game was the first time we got one of these done. I was trying to get my teammates all on the same page. During free throws, I was talking to each one of them on how we have to communicate.”
Piper brought it down to just two with 1:39 left in the game after converting a three-point play, 66-64, but then Ross and Alston put up four straight for the T-Birds as they led 70-66. But then Piper would score again, making it a two-point game.
It was getting loud and the tension was growing knowing the stakes of this game and recent history. Cooper Crawford for Piper drove in for a two-hand flush as SHHS led 71-70. Ross was then fouled off the inbounds play, made one of two free throws with about 10 seconds left and Piper couldn’t get a shot off as time expired.
“We talk to them every day about every day we have to take a step forward and we have to be a step better than what we were and we are. We finished off an outstanding team,” Darting said.
Cook had a team-high 25 points for Shawnee Heights, while Ross added 19 points and Alston put up 13 points and Scott added nine.
Derrick Jackson led all scorers with 27 points for Piper, Crawford had 17 points and Jaylen Taylor provided 11.
PIPER 70, SHAWNEE HEIGHTS 72
Piper 13 13 16 28 – 70
Shawnee Heights 21 13 24 14 – 72
Piper (5-4, 3-3) – Taylor 4 2-2 11, Jackson 7 13-14 27, Vogel 0 1-2 1, Brooks 3 0-2 6, Crawford 7 3-4 17, Labat 2 3-4 7, Sayles 0 1-2 1
Shawnee Heights (5-4, 4-3) – Alston 4 5-6 13, Lee 2 0-0 4, Cook 7 5-8 25, Ross 4 10-12 19, Scott 4 0-0 9, Halloran 2 0-0 2, Vega 0 0-2 0, Terrell 0 0-2 0
3-point goals – Piper 1 (Taylor 1), Shawnee Heights 8 (Cook 6, Scott 1, Halloran 1). Total fouls – Piper 23, Shawnee Heights 22. Fouled out – Brooks, Labat, Lee. Technical foul -- none.
