Boys basketball: Long Reach rallies past Hammond, 43-41

Darryl Taylor hit two free throws and Long Reach's defense forced two contested Hammond shots in the final eight seconds Friday, helping the Lightning put the finishing touches on a thrilling, 43-41, comeback victory.

After being down by 11, 33-22, two minutes into the fourth quarter, Long Reach (7-6, 8-8) picked up its defensive pressure and outscored the Golden Bears 21-8 the rest of the way to pull out the victory.

"Our seniors finally woke up a little bit," Long Reach coach Al Moraz Jr said. "We were playing terrible, but we kept trying to tell them that we could still win this game. It came down to energy. For those first three or so quarters, for whatever reason, we didn't bring it.

"Those last five, six minutes, we were a different team."

Taylor, who had been held scoreless for the first 31 minutes, scored five of the final six points for the Lightning. The final two of those came from the foul line with the score tied at 41.

"I was just thinking, 'I can't miss, we need these,' " Taylor said. "We'd worked so hard to come back, I needed to finish it off."

Hammond got two attempts to tie and force overtime, but James Turner's running lay-up attempt rimmed out and Brian Green's tip attempt came up short. Long Reach forward Daquan Hargrove (13 points, 11 rebounds) secured the rebound and held onto the ball as time expired.

The loss spoiled a terrific offensive night by Hammond's Turner, who finished with a game-high 23 points. Included in the effort was the game-tying lay-up with 13 seconds left that made it 41-41.

In fact, for much of the night, it looked as if Hammond was poised to snap its three-game losing skid. The Bears never trailed from the first minute of the opening quarter until the final two minutes of the fourth.

There was one stretch, between the end of the third quarter and beginning of the fourth that Hammond held Long Reach scoreless for nearly six straight minutes. It was at that point that the Bears grabbed their largest lead at 33-22.

But from that point on, in those final six minutes of regulation, it was all Long Reach. The Lightning ratcheted up their defensive pressure and got going with their transition game, jumpstarting an offense that had been stuck in neutral.

"We turned the pressure up by going full court man-to-man and then also throwing some zone pressure at them. I thought that got them a little uneasy and allowed us to raise the tempo up a little bit," Moraz said.

Following a foul shot by Taylor with 40 seconds left, Long Reach had its largest lead of the game at five points, 41-36.

Hammond did rally to tie, capped by Turner's lay-up, but could only watch as Taylor calmly knocked down the game clinching shots in the final seconds.

Long Reach 43, Hammond 41

LR (7-6, 8-8): Hargrove 13, Nowlin 12, Allmond 6, Taylor 5, Leconte 4, Ross 2, Brown 1.

Ha (5-8, 6-10): Turner 23, Echols 7, Blackwell 5, Green 4, Hendrick 2.

Half: 21-16 Ha.

Other games:

Wilde Lake 69, Howard 43