Mavericks avenge defeat to Barons

It was a tale of two halves — and a few extra sessions — on Tuesday night at the Miller School, as the homestanding Mavericks avenged an earlier loss to Blue Ridge with a 90-83 double-overtime win. Maryland-bound Mychal Parker led the way for Miller with a game-high 28 points off the bench to help his team win its sixth straight contest.

Blue Ridge (14-5) held off the Mavericks 52-51 on Jan. 12.

“A lot of our guys have been there before, playing against Blue Ridge and against Division I-type talent, and we made it a point as a coaching staff to remind them of that every time out,” said first-year Miller coach Scott Willard. “Blue Ridge is a great team. We knew they were going to make a run, so even with a big lead, I told our guys that they were good enough to come back against us.”

After Blue Ridge’s Malick Kone scored the Barons’ first 10 points, Miller battled back and grabbed a 17-14 lead after the opening period. Miller capitalized in the second, outscoring Blue Ridge 20-12 to lead by double digits at the break.

The trend continued after the break, as senior point guard D’Andre Corbin hit a 3-pointer from the left corner on the Mavericks’ first possession of the second half, then tried his luck from the right side and connected on another triple just over a minute later. Parker followed Corbin’s lead by completing a three-point play before an electrifying dunk that gave Miller its biggest lead of the evening at 50-32 with 3:43 left in the third quarter.

The Barons went on a 10-0 run to close the quarter and get back within single digits to open the fourth. Kone then scored seven of Blue Ridge’s next eight points as part of an 18-4 run, and the Barons had new life.

“It took a lot of heart. We had to battle hard to get back in the game, so I was proud of our guys,” said Barons coach Bill Ramsey. “The hustle was there, the effort was there, we’ve got some things to work on for sure.”

Parker scored five straight points after the run to put Miller back up by nine with five minutes left, and it appeared that Miller had it all but wrapped up. But Blue Ridge again refused to die, as the Barons went on a 14-5 to close regulation and force overtime.

Barons guard Kameron Latouche connected on a shot with 3:19 left in the first overtime to give Blue Ridge its first lead since the 4:39 mark of the first quarter, 67-66. Miller’s Hippolyte Tsafack responded, scoring six of his eight points in the period over the next few minutes, and Miller led 74-70 with 1:09 to go.

Latouche, who scored a team-high 24 for Blue Ridge, hit another big shot, and Darnell Turner added a huge put-back as time expired, and the game headed to a second overtime. With the contest knotted at 78 apiece, Corbin hit an improbable, off-balance shot while falling down to give the Mavericks (11-5) a lead that they would not relinquish, hitting all 12 of their free throw attempts down the stretch.

“[The win] was really big for us, being the last regular-season home game,” Corbin said. “Coach told us from the beginning [of the season], ‘We’re going to be running a new offense, it’s going to be different for us, it’s going to be frustrating at first, but if we stick with it, everything’s going to come together.’”

Corbin finished with 18 points, Tsafack added 17, and Brice Kofane had 10 for Miller. Kone added 23 and Turner had 12 in the losing effort for Blue Ridge, which had its own six-game winning streak halted.

With the win, Miller looks to close in on a state title defense, and the Mavericks know that they will need to continue to come together as a unit to do so.

“Earlier in the season, we were all playing our own game, we all wanted to do our own thing and we weren’t playing as a team,” Parker said. “The past couple of games, we’ve come together and everyone knows their roles and has contributed, and it’s working for us.”