Braves will have to wait for 13th title in Class 1

COLUMBIA — Scott County coach Ronnie Cookson calmly said sometimes free throws bounce in and other times they do not after his team's Class 1 semifinal loss to Jefferson on Thursday.

The Braves, trailing by two points with 1.5 seconds remaining, had their second-leading scorer, senior guard D.D. Gillespie, on the free-throw line with a chance to tie the game and possibly send it into overtime.

But Gillespie missed his two shots from the charity stripe. Jefferson's Craig Mattson collected the rebound off the second attempt, holding on to the basketball for dear life to preserve the 70-68 win at Mizzou Arena.

Jefferson (28-2), the two-time defending Class 1 state champion, advanced to today's title game against Glasgow. Scott County (27-3) will play in the third-place game against Fair Play (28-3) today at 10:40 a.m.

"D.D. really feels bad about missing the two free throws, but that's just the way it goes," Cookson said. "Anybody can miss free throws. It's just a ballgame. Maybe next time the ball will bounce in the other direction, and that's just basically what it was."

Gillespie was not made available afterward for comment.

Cookson did not blame Gillespie's misses as the Braves' main failed opportunity. Instead, he said his team had a chance late — leading by three points with 2 minutes, 44 seconds left — but could not put away Jefferson.

Scott County junior Drew Thomas agreed with Cookson.

"We've just got to learn how to keep the pace up a little bit," Thomas said. "If we've got a lead, we've got to keep the lead and instead of just letting them fouling and putting them on the line. They get two points. We've got to work on that."

Thomas said even though his team was matched against a Jefferson squad with more recent playoff experience, he was not nervous. He felt his teammates knew they had great talent and could beat any school in the final four, but they struggled offensively at times.

Another thing that hurt Scott County was Jefferson's strong shooting. The Eagles converted 57.8 percent of their field goals.

"They were hot," Cookson simply said about the Eagles' shooting.

Jefferson's hot start

The Braves often had difficulty staying with Jefferson in the first half. They went on a 7-0 run in the first 52 seconds of the contest, and led 23-13 after one quarter. The Eagles were able to increase their lead to 31-17 over the first 1:23 of the second quarter.

"We just didn't come out and play them like we usually do," Cookson said. "Didn't come out of the gate real strong."

Thomas added: "We weren't making our shots. We weren't rebounding well."

Jefferson clung to a nine-point lead midway through the third quarter, but that's when the Braves staged their first comeback, with Gillespie and guard Bobby Hatchett in some foul trouble. Scott County used an 18-5 rally over the final 4:06 of the third to gain the momentum and head into the fourth ahead 56-52.

Thomas, after struggling with his shot in the first half, scored 13 of his team's 18 points during the stretch, including the Braves' final 11 points of the third.

"I just tried to take another role that D.D. and Bobby had and pick up their slack there," Thomas said.

Cookson added: "Drew picked up the pace. He got to taking his game shots and got to shooting a little better. He should have done that in the first quarter. But anyway, everything is all right. The kids who came off the bench really helped us out, didn't turn the ball over, didn't make any mistakes."

Scott County picked up some intensity on its full-court pressure during the final run in the third, as seven points came after steals.

But Jefferson was able to relax and overcome the Braves' press and regain its own defensive strengths in the fourth quarter.

Jefferson coach Tim Jermain said his team just got back to its game plan.

"In the fourth quarter I thought we did a good job of playing our zone and kind of taking them out of what they were doing to us because they were really hitting some tough shots there at the end of the third quarter," Jermain said.

Hatchett said that Jefferson's size was difficult to overcome. The height advantage allowed the Eagles to see over the press and make better passes to avoid the pressure.

"They just pushed the ball up the floor, and evidently they had some open men that hit some shots — a couple people who hit some shots that we didn't know could shoot like that," Thomas said.

Jefferson tied it 66-66 with 1:17 remaining on a layup by Doug Archer, who was fouled and converted his free throw attempt to put Jefferson ahead 67-66. The Eagles then took a 69-66 lead with 43 seconds left.

Otto Porter scored a bucket with 10 seconds left on his second attempt after collecting the rebound off a 3-point miss by Thomas.

Jefferson led 69-68, and the Braves immediately fouled Mattson, who hit 1-of-2 free throws to make it 70-68.

The Braves got the basketball back with 6 seconds remaining. The ball was inbounded to Gillespie, who took it the length of the court and was fouled going up for a layup. Gillespie missed his two shots and Jefferson held on to advance to the championship.