Lewis-Palmer’s Jonathan Scott hit the game-winning free-throw. More photos. (Dan Mohrmann/CHSAANow.com)
MONUMENT — Jonathan Scott has shot thousands of free throws in his lifetime. So when he went to the line with less than a second on the clock and his Lewis-Palmer Rangers tied with Pueblo Central 54-54, he wasn’t worried.
Not even close.
He missed the first, but knocked down the second to give the CHSAANow.com No. 3 Lewis-Palmer a 55-54 win over the No. 4 Wildcats.
“I wasn’t worried about it,” Scott said about missing the first one. “I’ve shot a million free throws a million times so I wasn’t worried at all.”
But there was a point where he, his teammates and the fans packed into the gym at Lewis-Palmer High School had to be worried. Late in the fourth quarter, Lewis-Palmer trailed by as many as four. Pueblo Central’s Michael Ranson seemed like he could hit a behind the back shot from the stands with the way he was shooting.
Lewis-Palmer was in trouble. Especially considering that the Wildcats were without one of their captains. In a scrimmage last Saturday, Kobi Betts tore his meniscus and partially tore his ACL. He will have surgery in two weeks and will miss his senior season.
From the start, it was clear that Pueblo Central missed him.
“It was evident,” Wildcats coach Brad Ranson said. “We have a lot of inexperienced players and it showed late.”
But the one thing that Pueblo Central did have was Brad’s son Michael. Despite a slow start in which he came away with zero points in the first quarter, Ranson exploded in the second half, finishing with 39 points.
With the way his shots were falling, he was becoming a matchup nightmare for the Rangers, especially when Scott went out of the game with foul trouble.
Pueblo Central’s Mike Ranson (5) attempts to pass the ball during a game against Lewis-Palmer. More photos. (Dan Mohrmann/CHSAANow.com)
“Johnny’s a great defender,” Rangers guard Kyle Owens said. “But we have a mentality of next man up. With that, we put Joe (DeCoud) on him to try and get Mike different looks.”
When the Wildcats took a 45-43 lead in the fourth quarter Scott, who finished with 24 points, was brought back into the game. He would get to the free throw line and sink both to pull the Rangers to a 50-50 tie.
From there, Ranson and Scott would keep trading free throws. Scott hit two more to tie the game 54-54 with under a minute left. Lewis-Palmer coach Bill Benton called for a zone press, which paid off as the Rangers stole the ball and called timeout with four second left on the clock.
“There’s a part of you that says I wish we had done that a little bit sooner,” Benton said. “Here’s what I love about this group. They came over and said ‘Coach, let’s get in our 35 and stay in that.’ Then they’d talk about the next defense they wanted to go into and I let them do that.”
With four seconds left, Benton drew up an inbound play that would put the ball in the hands of either Scott or Owens. Whoever got it would then attack the basket and try to get fouled. The ball fell into Scott’s hands and that’s exactly what he did.
He got fouled with 0.5 seconds left on the clock and made a free throw to put his team ahead for good.
“We knew it was going to be tough with first game jitters,” Benton said. “We have to figure out our system and what works. I’m much happier to learning from a win, though, rather than a loss.”