Highs and lows lead to a win after nail-bitting loss With apologies to Charles Dickens, it truly was the best of times and the worst of times for Powell High School boys' basketball last week. Less than 48 hours after suffering a 46-45 loss at the buzzer against Rocky Mountain, the Panthers rebounded to knock off Lander 42-37. “After Thursday's loss, we had a team meeting on Friday and talked about some of the things we needed to do better,” said Panther head coach Mike Heny. “On Saturday, we played probably as good as we have all year in the second half and got the win.”

Chase Partridge scored 17 of his game-high 18 points after the intermission on Saturday as Powell rallied from a 17-10 halftime deficit. The sophomore's conventional 3-point play with 46 seconds remaining helped lift Powell into a four-point lead. After the Tigers banked home a 3-point bucket with 20 seconds to go, Partridge pulled down an offensive rebound off a missed free throw to prevent Lander from having a chance to force overtime.

Fellow sophomore Josh Cragoe also came up with a steal in the waning seconds to help preserve the win.

“At halftime, we'd identified that (Partridge's) area of the floor as one we needed to get the ball into,” said Heny. “We did a good job of passing the ball and extending their defense so that he'd be open and he made some strong moves to the bucket.”

The elation in the PHS gymnasium on Saturday stood in stark contrast to the hanging heads following Thursday's last-second loss. Rocky Mountain junior Brandon Foster played the role of spoiler by grabbing an offensive rebound with 1.6 seconds remaining and drilling a shot at the buzzer to give the Grizzlies a victory over Powell. The last-second drama capped a wild fourth quarter of action.

“We called time out to stress how we wanted to defend a miss,” said Heny. “Really, we did a good job of blocking out.

It was a case where one of their kids tipped it and it deflected right to him and he hit the shot.”

After leading throughout the first half and much of the third period, the Panthers found themselves staggering after Rocky Mountain connected for a trio of 3-point buckets in the fourth quarter. The last of those baskets lifted the Grizzlies into a 44-35 lead with less than four minutes to play.

Just when things appeared to be slipping away, the Panthers regrouped during a time out. Over the next three minutes, Powell embarked on a 10-0 run, capped by senior David Starcevich's driving layup with 55 seconds remaining, to regain the lead.

After missing a shot from the lane on their next possession, the visiting Grizzlies poked the ball away from Starcevich with nothing but a wide-open half-court standing between them and the go-ahead bucket. Instead, Rocky Mountain was whistled for carrying the ball during the scramble down court and the Panthers regained possession.

The Panthers misfired on a pair of free throw attempts with just over 12 seconds remaining that could have widened the gap, but the Grizzlies erred on the ensuing rebound by calling for a timeout before the ball reached midcourt. The re-start sent Rocky Mountain to the baseline opposite its basket with 7.8 seconds showing on the clock.

The Grizzlies appeared to be in trouble as they crossed the midcourt against a Panther double-team, but were bailed out when officials ruled Foster, who was turned mostly away from the bucket, was in the act of shooting. That sent the Grizzlies' junior to the line with 1.6 seconds remaining, where he misfired on three consecutive foul shots to set up the game's buzzer-beating finish.

“We never should have let the game get to that point,” said Heny. “If we take care of business sooner, hit better than 2-for-7 at the free throw line in the last period, then we're not in a situation where one shot at the buzzer can win it for them.”