Last Wednesday night (Feb. 20) North’s varsity basketball team competed with the Maine South Hawks, and lost by the small margin of three points, 64-61.
The first half, a back and forth battle between the two teams where a lead could barely be taken, was taken by the Hawks, 24-21.
The real action though was in the last quarter, when players like Billy Voitik didn’t give up and played tight defense on the Hawks.
“I think we were down about 10 points at the start of the 4th,” Voitik says. “Our whole team knew that we had to step it up. We really didn’t want to lose that game and stepped up on defense to force it into overtime.”
Pushing it into overtime is exactly what they did, and with three minutes on the clock, too. Senior, Captain Malachi Nix started it off with a three point shot at 3:09 taking the score to 47-43, Hawks’ lead. Then with 2:15 on the clock junior Jay jay Myles hit a three changing the score to a close 47-46. And finally with 55.6 seconds on the clock senior Harvey Penn took a game changing lay up putting the Vikings ahead at 47-48. A couple seconds later the Hawks also scored giving them a one point advantage, but first year varsity player Myles didn’t let his team down and took a risky three point shot with 8.2 seconds on the clock and sunk it to give the Vikings a two point lead. The Hawks answered with a lay up tying the game at 51-51 and forcing the game into overtime.
Overtime started out with the Hawks taking a two point lead, but Myles returned the favor with a three pointer to take the lead back, 53-54. It seems that almost immediately after North fouled giving Maine South two free throw shots, which were both successful giving South a one point advantage, 55-54. Senior BJ Beckford then took his chance with a minute and a half on the clock and sunk a three pointer to bring us back, and above the Hawks, 55-57. Maine South with several seconds left on the clock managed a layup to retie the score at 57-57.
In double overtime things got even more intense with close calls, fouls and time outs. The Vikings hard work in the end didn’t cut it and the Hawks won 64-61.
But they’re not done yet! Click the link below to read about the growing fan problem at Niles North, and to check out the boys’ schedule for the rest of the season.
Go Vikings!
