CUMBERLAND — Trailing by two after an East Hardy bucket with eight seconds left and a timeout in his pocket, Fort Hill’s Thad Burner trusted his guys.
Burner elected to not use it, and Jameson Powell-Morris took the inbounds pass, raced across halfcourt and found a streaking Liam Hamilton in stride. Hamilton took one dribble and rose over the 6-foot-6 Gideon Good, sinking a shot at the buzzer to force overtime.
With all the momentum, third-ranked Fort Hill used a key triple from Sam Spencer to go up two scores late, and the Sentinels outlasted East Hardy, 64-58, in overtime on Wednesday night.
“Our kids showed a lot of perseverance to give up 23 points in the fourth quarter and only get 13, and to not panic and tie the game back up and get it into overtime,” Burner said. “I’m proud of them for that.”
Hamilton recorded a double-double for Fort Hill (9-3) with 20 points, 12 rebounds and five assists. He was one of four Sentinels in double figures along with Spencer (14), Powell-Morris (12) and Melo Palmisano (12).
East Hardy (5-4) was paced by Good’s 18 points and Evan Hamilton’s 16.
Spencer’s triple with 34 seconds left, which bounced high off the iron and fell through the netting for what proved to be an insurmountable 62-58 lead, answered a banked-in triple by Aubrey McCullough 30 seconds prior.
Those makes were two of several examples of clutch shot-making in the final moments of regulation and overtime.
East Hardy’s Levi Price sunk a triple with 50 seconds left in the fourth quarter for a 51-49 lead.
Neek Taylor buried a pair at the free-throw line with 19.4 remaining, and McCullough fired back with a floater in the lane with 8.4 seconds on the clock, setting the stage for Hamilton’s game-tying heroics.
“They’re one of the toughest teams I’ve played in all three years of my varsity,” Hamilton said of the Cougars, who Fort Hill beat 53-48 a week prior. “They play very physical, and they’re big. (Good’s) really hard to guard.”
East Hardy scratched and clawed to be in position to win the game, trailing 46-36 with 4:30 to play.
The Cougars responded with a 12-0 run, capped by a Hamilton triple that gave East Hardy its first lead, 48-46, with 1:51 remaining in regulation.
“They just kept making shots all night,” East Hardy head coach Chris Hahn said of Fort Hill. “I thought we were doing a pretty good job of playing defense. … One kid would get a little bit loose, and they buried it every time.
“The idea was to stick around. I tried to keep those timeouts in my pocket so we could get our press set up and make a run at them.”
East Hardy forced turnovers using a 2-2-1 full-court press to get back in it, and its unusual 2-3 matchup zone gave the Sentinels trouble at times.
Fort Hill beamed about its bench prior to the season, and it’s starting to materialize. The Sentinels led in bench points 28-11.
“I think guys are maturing a little bit,” Burner said. “They’re understanding their role. As a coaching staff, we’re starting to gain a little bit more trust in some of those guys.”
Palmisano was key in helping the Sentinels fend off East Hardy’s rallies. The reserve guard had triples in each of the final three quarters, burying two in the fourth and four overall. Spencer had three 3-pointers off the bench.
Fort Hill led 10-7 after the first quarter, 25-23 at the half and 40-30 after three periods.
Fort Hill (2-1 Western Maryland Athletic Conference), which has now won seven of its past eight games, heads to No. 1 Southern (8-5, 4-0 WestMAC) on Monday at 7 p.m., though the game is likely to be impacted by snow around the area this weekend.
East Hardy hosts Tygarts Valley on Friday night.
Wednesday marked the first game East Hardy has played at full strength, as guard Mason Hamilton returned to the lineup.
The Cougars are hoping their early-season tests pay dividends late in the campaign.
“We were punching down a little bit last year,” Hahn said, “and so scheduling these guys, we can come in here and give them a shot, figure out what our weaknesses are so that we can work on them. We don’t get a lot better when we’re playing people that we’re beating up on.”