Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 26, 1994 TAG: 9402260136
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: RAY COX STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
But after almost constant fourth-quarter peril, along came overtime and the extra three minutes was what the Blue Devils needed to win the basketball game.
Top-seeded Grayson County gathered its wits in the additional period to turn back Giles 56-53 in a semifinal of the Mountain Empire District tournament Friday night at Christiansburg High School.
The Blue Devils (20-3) play the winner of the Auburn-Floyd County nightcap for the title at 8 p.m. today at Christiansburg.
After leading 43-33 to start the fourth quarter, Grayson County had to survive, in order: a 15-2 Giles run; the disqualification on fouls of its leading scorer, Brian Boyer; a two-shot foul (caused by Boyer's infraction) with one second left by Spartans sophomore John King that, had he made both, would have won the game; a turnover on the subsequent inbounds play; and a play for a last-second shot to King that worked in every respect but the final result as time expired.
"I'm used to this by now," said Grayson County's coach, John Ayers. "You see this receding hairline? I didn't have that before this year. All I keep saying is, `What are you guys trying to do to me?' "
All the Blue Devils did this time was win the game in overtime by turning a couple of great defensive plays and making a six-point lead hold up for their 25-year-old coach.
The two stops were drawn charges on the Spartans' Anthony Myers and Marty Smith.
"Those charges, by Shane Griffith and Shane Widner, were what won the game for us," said Grayson's Keith Weatherman, who scored three of his five points in overtime.
Mitch Reed of Giles banked in a 3-pointer with 30 seconds left to trim the deficit to 56-53, and after Daniel Osborne missed the front end of a one-and-one free throw for Grayson with 23 seconds left, Giles got three more shots. But it could not convert.
"We had our shots," was all Spartans coach John Howlett could say.
Giles (13-9) won 12 of its last 15 games, including a school-record eight in a row. But all three losses in that span came to Grayson County, the last two in overtime.
No question, Giles had a big hand in its own demise on this occasion. The 23 turnovers hurt. So did missing eight of 12 free throws.
But the free throw the Spartans had to have, from King, they got.
"He's the worst free-throw shooter we have," Howlett said. "I was glad to get one of them."
That was the second. He missed the first, perhaps because he listened to Grayson's Griffith chat while he stood at the line.
"I told him there was no pressure," Griffith said. "He's young. He still has two more years to play. No problem."
But when the Devils turned over the ball on the inbounds play, Giles had one more shot. The play, a modified alley-oop off a screen, worked marvelously. All but the last part, when the shot was short.
"We should have won there," Howlett said.
Boyer scored 15 and Griffith and Widner had 13 each for the winners. Giles got 16 out of Patrick Steele, who fouled out, and 10 from Myers.
Boyer and Steele had the toughest assignments, to sit with the game on the line.
"All you can do is hope for the best," Boyer said. "I had faith that they'd do the right thing." \
see microfilm for box score
by CNB