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Belpre earns overtime win over Wahama

MIKE MORRISON The Marietta Times Belpre’s Mythius Houghton (21) tries to get past Wahama’s Travis Kearns (23) during a high school basketball basketball game Friday.

By Mike Morrison

The Marietta Times

BELPRE — Things looked rather bleak early in the fourth quarter for the Belpre Golden Eagles in their home opener against Wahama Friday night.

A rare five-point play by Wahama’s Noah Litchfield had given the White Falcons a 16-point lead with just seven minutes to play in the game and to make matters worse the Eagles lost one of their better players when senior Deijon Bedgood fouled out on the play.

Led by senior point guard Mythius Houghton, Belpre came charging back as they outscored Wahama 26-10 the rest of the fourth quarter to force overtime before going on to a 75-71 win.

Houghton came up with six steals in the final period alone and scored 21 of his team-high 23 points in the fourth quarter and overtime as Belpre pulled off the thrilling come-from-behind win.

Belpre played pressure defense the entire game which finally seemed to wear down a Wahama team that played just six players.

“We don’t have a lot of size and we have really been working on our pressure defense,” said Belpre head coach Chad Williams.

“We are very quick and we have to be able to get the turnovers and easy buckets and we were able to do that late in the game tonight.”

Wahama led by just three at the intermission (31-28) but came out on fire in the third period to increase their lead to 49-37 at the end of three periods of play.

Litchfield’s rare five-point play gave the Falcons their biggest lead of the game as he drove the length of the court for a lay-up and was fouled by Bedgood who was also assessed a technical foul on the play to give Litchfield a total of three free throws.

Belpre got a huge spark off of their bench when freshman Brandon Simoniette drilled back-to-back triples early in the fourth quarter to quickly cut the lead back to 10.

A free throw by Jesse Collins made it a nine-point game and a steal and bucket from Houghton cut the lead to 53-46 with five minutes to play in regulation.

A Litchfield bucket briefly halted the Golden Eagle momentum but Logan Adams, yet another Belpre freshman, drilled a 3-pointer and just like that the lead was cut to six.

Houghton came up with three more steals in a matter of two minutes and his steal and bucket with less than a minute to play brought the Eagles to within a pair of Wahama at 61-59.

“It was just a great team effort that we all put in to fight our way back into it,” said Houghton, who finished the game just two assists shy of a triple-double as he tallied eight assists and 10 steals to go along with his 23 points. “We all decided we were going keep our heads up and come back and get this one.”

Belpre finally got back to even as Nate Godfrey came up with a huge offensive rebound that he put back in for the tying score with just 30 seconds to play in the game.

Litchfield connected on a perfect 12-for-12 from the charity stripe including a clutch pair with 23 seconds to play to put the White Falcons back in front.

Belpre came up empty on their first attempt to tie the game back up but a huge rebound by Logan Adams in the closing seconds gave them one last shot at forcing extended play.

Houghton’s attempts at a game-winning 3-pointer was no good but a foul was called on the shot sending him to the line to shoot three freebies with just 2.5 seconds remaining on the clock.

Houghton made good on the first two but his third bounced off the rim sending the game to overtime.

Litchfield, who led all scorers in the game with 32, opened the overtime period with a score to put the Falcons back in front but Houghton answered with another bucket in transition to knot the score and then gave the Golden Eagles their first lead since the opening quarter when he drained a triple with two minutes left. A pair of free throws by Houghton made it a 70-65 game and despite connecting on just 16-of-29 free throw attempts in the game, Belpre managed to make enough down the stretch to hold off the Falcons and earn the dramatic win.

“It was really a great team effort and I just love these guys and love the heart and energy they played with tonight,” said Williams. “It’s good to get this first one out of the way. We’ve got to keep protecting our house and keep battling.”

Joining Houghton in double figures for Belpre was Godfrey with 15 while Adams and Simoniette finished with 11 and 10 points respectively.

Hoffman scored 22 points and hauled down a game-high 19 rebounds for Wahama in their season opener.

“We just turned it over way too many times. Belpre is an excellent team and they were up in our face pressuring us all night long and we just didn’t handle it very well,” said Wahama head coach Ron Bradley. “I’m proud of our kids they played hard. It was just a great game and the kind of game you like to be involved in.”

Belpre will return to action Tuesday when they travel to Miller.

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