SOUTHERN PINES — The Richmond Senior High School boys’ basketball team suffered its first loss of the season on Wednesday.
After starting the season with 15 straight wins, which set a program record to start a new campaign and tied another for the most consecutive wins in a row altogether, the Raiders couldn’t overcome the Patriots on the road.
In what head coach Donald Pettigrew called a “back-and-forth game” that saw the top two teams in the Sandhills Athletic Conference trade shots in all four quarters, Richmond lost to Pinecrest 80-76.
When the two teams met for the first time this season on Dec. 10, the Raiders won 68-40. Now heading into the final stretch of the regular season, the Raiders and Patriots are tied for first place in the SAC.
“Pinecrest did a good job coming out and playing with a lot of emotion, and they shot the ball well tonight,” Pettigrew said. “Defensively, we missed some assignments but that’s on me. I have to do a better job of getting my guys ready to play.
“Our guys played hard and that’s all I can ask for,” he added. “We’ve been in this position before and had a chance to win it in the end.”
With the Raiders trailing 78-76 following a putback by sophomore Paul McNeil with 17.6 seconds left, Pinecrest was fouled and went to the line. A missed one-and-one opportunity allowed the Raiders to bring the ball down the court.
Sophomore Jamarion Wall, who finished with 18 points, attempted a three-pointer from the right corner. His shot missed and was rebounded by Pinecrest’s Jullien Cole, who was fouled and hit the game-clinching free throws with 4.6 seconds left.
“In the last timeout, I should have told the guys to try and get the ball to Paul,” Pettigrew said. “But Jamarion was just trying to make a play and that’s always good. Had he made it, it’d be a different story.
“We still have a lot of basketball left in us, so we’ll continue to get better and try and make this run since we’re tied for first.”
The Raiders took a 14-13 lead after the first quarter, using five players to get on the board. McNeil, who ended with a game-high 19 points, scored four points early. He missed the majority of the third quarter due to a lower leg injury, but returned to score 13 points in the fourth.
A 14-2 run by Pinecrest to open the second quarter put the Patriots up 27-16 with 2:19 left in the half.
Helping cut the halftime deficit to 31-25 was a three-pointer from sophomore Javian Drake, who tallied 11 points, including five in the first half.
Junior Dakota Chavis, who ended the game with 18 points, added a drive and two free throws before half. Junior Zion Baldwin knocked home a pair of shots from the charity stripe with 18.9 seconds remaining.
Pinecrest (12-4, 5-1) relied on the second-half scoring of Cole, J.D. Scarbrough and Colby Wallace to stay ahead of the Raiders. Cole scored eight of his team-high 17 points in the fourth quarter, and Wallace added 13 of his 15 points in the final two periods.
Scarbrough chipped in 11 second-half points, ending the game with 13 points. Six points from J.J. Goins in the third distanced the Patriots, who held a lead as large as nine points in the second half.
The Raiders netted 23 points in the third, led by six points each from Baldwin, Drake and Wall. Chavis chipped in five points on a triple and two field goals.
In the closing eight minutes, Richmond tallied 28 more points and started with a 5-0 run thanks to a Wall three-pointer, the first of his three triples in the frame, and two Chavis free throws.
McNeil and Wall combined for Richmond’s next 12 points to make it a one-point deficit, 66-65, with 3:01 to play.
But for every shot the Raiders made, the Patriots had an answer. Wall knocked down his final three with just over a minute left, setting up two Chavis free throws and the McNeil bucket that made it 78-76.
Baldwin finished the game as the fifth Raider in double digits with 10 points.
Pettigrew said losing a game is never the goal, but that sometimes a loss can be “humbling.”
“Yeah, it can most definitely be (humbling),” he closed. “But now it’s back to the drawing board. I was out-coached tonight and hopefully we can get back to working hard at practice tomorrow.”
Richmond (15-1, 5-1 SAC) will make its long-awaited return to its home floor on Friday, playing in front of its home crowd for the first time since Dec. 21.
The Raiders will look to get back in the win column with a game against fourth-place Hoke County High School (9-4, 5-3 SAC). Tip-off is set for 7:30 p.m.
