Trailing by as much as 19 points in the second half and behind by 16 going into the fourth quarter, the Houston High School boys basketball team almost pulled off an amazing comeback in a game against Viola, Ark., on Wednesday at the annual Cabool Holiday Tournament.
But after the Tigers cut the deficit to a single point, the clock got the better of them and they ended up falling 61-59.
“I’ve never been so proud of a team and so mad at a team at the same time,” said HHS head coach Jim Moore.
Seeded ninth in the event’s 14-team field, the Longhorns dominated much of the first half against No. 14 Houston and were ahead 34-17 at the break. Senior guard Braden Williams did the bulk of the damage, sinking three 3-point shots and scoring 20 points in the first half.
The Tigers then took Williams out of the Longhorns’ offense in the second half, at first employing effective box-and-1 defense with senior Stone Jackson hounding him wherever he went on the offensive end of the court and then switching to man-to-man with junior Zeke Grange containing him.
But the Longhorns were still up 48-32 going into the fourth period. Then Houston caught fire.
Holding Viola to only 1 field goal in the final 8 minutes, the Tigers scored a whopping 27 points, cutting the margin to 60-59 on a driving layup by junior guard Jordan Arthur with 10 seconds to go in the contest.
But after the Longhorns got a free throw with 3.1 seconds, remaining, the game ended with Jackson heaving a 70-footer as the final horn sounded.
“The third quarter wasn’t bad – we just kind of played with them,” Moore said, “but then we decided to play like we can, and it got exciting. You could tell they were rattled, and they called some timeouts to try to stop the bleeding.
“They never did stop it; we just ran out of time.”
Senior forward Brady Brookshire led Houston in scoring in the game with 19 points, while Arthur had 12 and sophomore guard DJ Riley had 10 (all during the fourth-quarter rally). Jackson drained three treys and finished with 9 points.
Senior forward Quade Perryman scored 13 points for Viola, while junior forward Kody Hart went 5-for-6 from the foul line and finished with 11.
The Tigers might have been able to outscore the Longhorns without a comeback, but missed shots from point-blank range on multiple occasions (including during crunch time late in the fourth period).
“If we had another 30 seconds, we probably would have won the game,” Moore said, “but we should have won anyway. The first half was frustrating; we missed a lot of uncontested layups and a couple of put-back opportunities, and we fumbled the ball around a bit on rebounds. And we also let their best player go off on us, and you can’t do that, especially when you know who their best player is and you’ve had discussions on how to keep him from doing what he did.”
Thanks to the efforts of Jackson and Grange, Williams had no field goals and scored only 5 points in the second half, going 5-for-12 from the free throw line.
“I thought overall we really stepped up our defense in the second half,” Moore said. “And when that started happening, our offense came alive. I thought in the fourth quarter we played the best team ball I’ve seen in the last two years. We were getting the ball into the hands of the guys who needed it, we were making good decisions, and we were getting rewarded for it.
“It was fun to watch, and it was exciting to see because it showed how good this team can be when we play like that.”
The Tigers opened the tournament Tuesday with a first round game against top-seeded Norwood Pirates and were defeated 85-36.
Brookshire led Houston in scoring in the contest with 10 points (all in the first half), while Jackson and Riley each had 7 and Arthur and junior guard Dylan Dzurick both added 6.
All five of the Pirates’ starters scored in double-figures in the game. Juniors Gunner Bradshaw and Jordan Williams led the way with 18 points apiece.
Next week, the Tigers (1-6) host Newburg on Tuesday and face Summersville in a Friday home game.
“We’re gaining more and more confidence every time we play,” Moore said. “I see what we’re capable of every day in practice, and I’ve seen spurts of it in games. We’ve got to be able to put four quarters together, and when we do, someone’s going to be in trouble.
“But it’s time to quit talking about it and do it.”
