Boys’ basketball: Colton Carson tips Oxford Hills past Greely

Tanner Herrick of Oxford Hills and Nick Butler of Greely reach for a rebound in the first quarter Saturday. (Portland Press Herald photo by Derek Davis)

CUMBERLAND — After seemingly giving his team a big win, all Colton Carson could think was “not again” as he watched Greely’s Logan Bagshaw get off a potential game-winner of his own.

Luckily for Carson and Oxford Hills, it didn’t happen again.

Carson’s tip-in with two seconds left was the difference as the Vikings held off the Rangers, 59-57, in a back-and-forth boys’ basketball contest Saturday.

Bagshaw’s long 3-point attempt with 1.4 seconds left missed the mark, allowing Carson and the Vikings to breath.

“I was right there, and I had a hand in the face. I looked back, and I was like, ‘Oh shoot, just like Portland.’ Because we lost on a last-second buzzer-beater on that,” Carson said. “But it was off, and a great win for us.”

Earlier in the season, the Vikings had a would-be win taken away when Portland hit a game-tying 3 at the buzzer and then won in overtime.

Saturday’s game was tied in the closing seconds, but Carson’s putback of a Spencer Strong miss gave the Vikings (7-4) the final advantage.

“I was fighting for position underneath, and I just saw the ball hit the back of the backboard, kind of roll off the front rim, and I just went up to get the rebound and just ended up tipping it in, and it worked out well for us,” said Carson, whose points on the basket were his first points of the fourth quarter after totalling 17 in the first three quarters.

“I think they beat us on the rebounding side,” Greely coach Travis Seaver said. “We talked all game about offensive boards, and unfortunately that’s what hurt us at the end.”

After Carson’s go-ahead tapper, the clock initially ran down to zeroes as Seaver was trying to call timeout, but the officials put two seconds back on the clock. The Rangers (7-3) used 0.6 second of the remaining time to get an inbounds pass from under the Vikings’ basket to midcourt. After using a third timeout in the sequence, Bagshaw inbounded to Drew Storey, who gave it back to Bagshaw for the final look.

“We didn’t guard it right,” Oxford Hills coach Scott Graffam said. “We knew he was going to get it coming back, and we didn’t take the angle away. That was a long shot, but, you know, he’s well within (range of) making it. You know, sometimes you get lucky and sometimes you don’t. Portland hit one on us earlier, so it’s kind of karma coming back.”

Greely got exactly what it wanted out of the play, except for the result.

“We had the guy, the right guy, with the ball in his hands, and the shot that we drew up. So we executed it, just didn’t fall,” Seaver said.

Carson and Storey (18 points) got the game rolling in the first quarter. Carson scored the Vikings’ first seven points to put them ahead 7-3. Then, with the Rangers trailing 9-4, Storey rang off 11 straight points to give Greely a 15-13 lead on a two-handed dunk with 33 seconds left in the period.

Oxford Hills trailed 32-26 at halftime, with Carson contributing 13 of his 19 points.

It was after halftime that Strong got going, scoring 18 of his team-high 22.

“Spencer’s had some games like that, where he figures out how they’re going to guard him, or what’s going to happen,” Graffam said. “He was kind of pressing in the first half.”

Bagshaw also had a slow start, with just a couple made free throws in the first quarter, but he heated up for a game-high 25 points, including five 3s.

He just couldn’t get a sixth to fall.

wkramlich@sunjournal.com