If Friday night is a precursor to when these two meet at David Evans Fieldhouse at Holmes in the boys 35th District tournament semifinals, you’re going to get your price of admission and then some.
Beechwood and Holy Cross have already had two battles this season, the latest a Tigers 66-64 victory in triple overtime.
The Indians got the first meeting in the 9th Region All “A” semifinals in January, setting up a rubber match for Feb. 28 when the two will meet again in the 35th District tournament semifinals.
The Tigers victory earned themselves the No. 2 seed for the district tournament, Friday’s contest deciding who would wear which jersey with Covington Catholic already locked into the No. 1 seed and Holmes with the four-seed. Holy Cross will be the No. 3 seed.
“My speech after the game and I told the guys was going to be the same whether we would have won this game or lost the game. It’s great, but in the grand scheme of things, the one that matters is in two weeks,” Tigers coach Ross Hart said.
In a game that would not end, Holy Cross just ran out of bullets in the chamber. They originally forced overtime on William McElheney’s 3-pointer in the closing seconds of regulation to tie the game at 50.
In the first overtime, it was Nate Rominger hitting a layup with six seconds to play to send the game to a second overtime.
Trailing by three in the second overtime, Gavin Goetz’s triple tied the game up with less than a minute to play.
They had a chance to win it in the third overtime, but missed a corner 3-pointer in the closing seconds, Beechwood able to secure the victory with a rebound with 0.3 seconds remaining.
“They just made one more play than we did,” Indians coach Ricardo Johnson said. “They made plays when we didn’t.”
What got Beechwood to the finish line was a mixture of zone defenses to try and confuse a Holy Cross team playing their first full game without starting guard Luke Arlinghaus, out due to injury.
Carson Blackburn led the Tigers with 24 points, eight of them coming in the overtimes, Jack Sullivan with 17 points, pacing the Tigers early with 10 first half points, Austin Navin carrying the scoring load in the third with eight of his 12 points in the frame and Owen McCormack hitting a vital 3-pointer in the third overtime and finishing with nine points.
“Just happy to learn with these guys after a win compared to after a loss,” Hart said. “A lot of people talk about how they (Holy Cross) lost everybody from last year, but so did we. We returned Jack Sullivan and a few guys that got a minute or two here or there. But these kids are growing up.”
Holy Cross tried to counter with Nate Rominger leading the Indians with 21 points, 13 of them coming in the first half, Brady Gabbard collecting 15 points and hitting three 3-pointers, McElheney with 13 points before fouling out in overtime and Gavin Goetz finishing with eight points that included some clutch buckets in the fourth quarter and overtimes. The Indians struggled to shoot it, hitting 23-of-55 from the field.
“We have a certain standard we obtain to run an offense and we didn’t do it to that expectation tonight. We just have to continue to get better,” Johnson said.
As expected, the game was tight throughout, Beechwood jumped out to an 8-2 lead before Holy Cross took leads of 14-13 after the first and 24-23 into halftime.
Navin finished the third quarter on a personal 8-3 run for the Tigers to give them a 39-32 lead after three. His 3-point play in the fourth opened Beechwood and the game’s biggest lead of the night at 42-34 with 6:01 to play.
The Indians mounted their run, scoring 13 of the next 18 points to tie the game at 47 on a Rominger layup. Sullivan then hit 3-of-4 from the free throw line in the last minute, McElheney’s triple sending the Holy Cross fan section into a frenzy as the game went to OT.
“We wanted to foul, but we were in a tough spot with 11 seconds left so we didn’t want to foul too early and then once they get in their action our guys were a little hesitant and didn’t want to foul the shooter,” Hart said. “Credit to McElheney for knocking that down and sending it to overtime.”
Blackburn got the Tigers up 53-50 after the Indians held the ball the first two minutes of the first overtime, McElheney and Rominger getting buckets with Navin hitting 1-of-2 from the line sandwiched in-between to get the game to a second overtime.
The Tigers once again jumped out in the extra period, scoring the first four points of the second overtime for a 58-54 lead. Rominger hit two free throws, Beechwood’s Tyler Fryman then went 1-of-2 from the line before Goetz’s triple to send the game to the third overtime.
Blackburn and McCormack hit triples in the third OT to make it 65-61 Tigers, Gabbard answering with a triple to make it 65-64. Beechwood then missed two free throws, giving the Indians one last chance, but couldn’t find another answer.
“Our guys are very resilient,” Hart said. “Whenever they did make a mistake tonight, they’d turnaround and get a steal or grab a huge rebound or make a huge 3-pointer down the stretch. I thought they showed a lot of resiliency tonight.”
Circle the calendar now, the two will meet again on Feb. 28 with the season on the line.
“I’m not into moral victories, we just didn’t get it done and make enough plays when it counted and weren’t sound defensively,” Johnson said. ” It’s a district game and it means a lot and we’ll see them again. Hats off to Beechwood, they got it done and we didn’t.”
TIGERS 66, INDIANS 64 (3 OT)
HOLY CROSS — 14-10-8-18-4-5-5 — 64
BEECHWOOD — 13-10-16-11-4-5-7 — 66
Scoring
Holy Cross (64) — Rominger 21, Gabbard 15, McElheney 13, Goetz 8, Crail 5, Urlage 2
Beechwood (66) — Blackburn 24, Sullivan 17, Navin 12, McCormack 9, Eviston 3, Fryman 1
Game Stats
Field Goals: Holy Cross 23/55, Beechwood 20/43
3-Pointers: Holy Cross 6/21, Beechwood 5/13
Free Throws: Holy Cross 12/17, Beechwood 21/32
Rebounds: Holy Cross 32, Beechwood 29
Assists: Holy Cross 13, Beechwood 7
Steals: Holy Cross 7, Beechwood 8
Turnovers: Holy Cross 15, Beechwood 18
Fouls: Holy Cross 23, Beechwood 18
Records: Holy Cross (14-10, 1-2), Beechwood (12-12, 2-1)
