FREEPORT — Freeport High barely survived a three-point barrage by Wells in the fourth quarter Thursday night, then won the Western Maine Conference boys’ basketball game in overtime, 58-53.
Class B Wells, which entered with a 4-0 record, trailed by double digits for much of the game but rallied from 10 points down to take a 52-48 lead, and still led by two with 25 seconds left and had the ball.
Freeport senior Connor Slocum cleanly swiped the inbounds pass and Will Maneikis was able to convert inside with 17 seconds left to tie the game. Wells’ last shot didn’t fall, sending the game to overtime.
“That was a big-time play,” by Slocum, said Freeport Coach Tyler Tracy. “He was an all-conference defensive player last year.”
Slocum said he expected Wells to try to get the ball to senior guard Eli Roy who, in Slocum’s words is, “consistently their best player.”
“I just stayed as close as I could. I saw the bounce pass coming and jumped in front of it. I try to be the energy guy,” Slocum said.
JT Pound, who scored a game-high 21 points, put the Falcons (3-1) ahead to stay with two free throws with 1:49 left in overtime, Maneikis finished off his 16-point night with two baskets. Slocum added 13 points for Freeport.
Wells also had three players in double figures. Roy and Jeremy Therrien each had 15 points, with Roy keeping Wells in contact with 10 first-half points and Therrien doing all of his scoring in the second half. Keith Ramsey had 14 points off the bench.
Freeport led 18-12 after a quarter and 30-17 at the half, thanks in large part to scoring 10 points off second-chance baskets and taking 38 shots compared to 24 for Wells.
The Falcons still had a comfortable 40-30 lead after three quarters, but Wells gained equilibrium in the rebounding department and Jeremy Therrien (15 points) had given Wells some positive mojo in the third quarter with seven points on consecutive possessions. He made a 3-pointer and a transition layup, getting fouled and making the free throw on both shots.
“The defense was better in the second half but it was still sloppy. We just shot the ball better, finally,” said Wells Coach Troy Brown. “At the end of the game we’ve got to be able to hold onto the ball for a minute. We should be good enough to do that and we couldn’t do it.”
One thing Wells had not done was get a second-chance basket itself. That changed when Ramsey knocked in a mid-range jumper after a teammate’s offensive rebound.
Then Ramsey really heated up, making four straight 3-point baskets without a miss, scoring all 14 of his points in the period.
“We’re a 3-point shooting team but we’ve been slow to start the season,” Ramsey said. “It really kind of started going today, at least for me, and it’s really just trusting that shooters are going to keep shooting and they’re going to start falling eventually.”
Therrien added two 3s of his own – the first producing a tie at 44-44 with three minutes to play and the second answering a Pound 3-pointer for a 50-48 lead.
On Freeport’s next possession, Roy stole the ball and fed Therrien for a layup and a 52-48 lead.
Pound got two points back with an offensive putback. Then Wells tried to drain the clock as Freeport, which hadn’t fouled in the quarter to that point, tried to go for hard steals to no avail.
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