ROCKINGHAM — Leading for all but 59 seconds of Friday’s Mid-South Conference game, the Richmond Raider basketball team again relied on late free throws to defeat Pinecrest High School for a second time in two weeks.
It was senior night for the Raiders and head coach Donald Pettigrew, who celebrated the team’s four senior players and three senior managers before tip-off.
Senior players this season were Jayden Hamilton, Yusaun Harrison, Amer Morrison and Domonic Tillman. Helping as team managers this winter have been Nasir Covington, Kendrick McCollum and Davion Watkins.
Thanks in part to eight three-pointers in the game, including six in the first half, the Raiders swept the Patriots behind a score of 78-66 and maintained first place in the MSC standings.
Morrison made a layup following a steal with 6:01 left in the first quarter, which gave Richmond the lead for the rest of the game. Leading by as many as 14 points, the Raiders held a double-digit lead for parts of the second quarter and all of the third quarter.
In true rivalry fashion, however, the Patriots pulled within as few as four points in the final quarter. Richmond secured the win late by scoring 10 of its 16 fourth-quarter points from the free throw line.
Four players ended the game with double figures for Richmond, led by junior Chance Crowder’s 19 points. He made a team-high four three-pointers, all of which were scored in the first half.
Hamilton scored 16 points, half of them coming in the third quarter. Sophomore Donovan Jones chipped in 15 points off the bench and Morrison scored 13 points.
An eight-player effort was used by Richmond to defeat the Patriots. Other contributors were freshman Cam’ron Coley (6 points), sophomore Kerick Hairston Jr. (5 points), and Harrison and junior Josiah Brewington (2 points each).
“Having played them a couple weeks ago and falling behind early (on Jan. 29), we had a better game plan tonight of what we needed to do to have a fast start,” Pettigrew said. “I’m so proud of the guys for starting the way they did and being resilient late in the game with free throws.
“We love playing in front of a big crowd and we fed off that energy tonight,” he added. “It was a special night for our seniors and everyone on the team wanted to get this win for them. This was a good team win as we head into the last week of the regular season.”
Two hefty scoring stretches in the first quarter by the Raiders, runs of 11-6 and 10-7, gave them a 21-13 lead after the opening eight minutes.
Erasing a two-point deficit, Coley muscled his way to the basket in transition to knot the score. Morrison followed on the next two possessions for his first points in the quarter, turning a steal into a bucket before draining a three-pointer from the left corner.
Up 7-2, Coley finished another drive and Jones knocked in a pair of free throws to make it 11-6 to start his scoring. Jones added a basket under the rim a couple of possessions later to keep Richmond up 13-8.
Crowder splashed down his first three-pointer of the game from the right wing with 1:55 on the clock. A dish from Morrison found Harrison for an easy two points off the glass to extend the lead.
Hamilton put an exclamation point on the quarter when he pulled up for a deep triple near the top of the arc with a minute to go, sinking the shot to send the Raiders into the second up by nine points.
An old-fashioned three-point play by Jones is how the second stanza started for Richmond, but Pinecrest answered with a 7-0 run to make it a 24-20 game. Crowder ended that stretch by the visitors when he mirrored his first triple with his second three-ball along the right side.
Less than a minute later, Crowder opened the lead back to seven points, 30-23, when he made a contested three-pointer at the top of the arc.
Pinecrest cut its deficit again to four points, but a 7-0 run by the Raiders inside the final two minutes of the half helped regain a double-digit lead.
Hamilton started it with a transition drive, which was followed by another Crowder shot from downtown and two free throws from Brewington. A basket by Pinecrest to close the half sent Richmond into the locker room up 37-28.
A high-scoring third quarter for both teams saw the Raiders outpace the Patriots 25-21. Hamilton had the first four points in the opening 30 seconds on a pair of drives, and Coley netted his final basket of the game to make it 43-30 with 6:37 on the clock.
Two more points from Hamilton were followed by Hairston Jr. making a three-pointer from near the center of the floor, which gave the Raiders the first of their two 14-point leads in the quarter. Hairston Jr. was then fouled on a three-ball attempt and made two of the three free throw attempts to make it 50-36 near the midway point of the quarter.
Morrison sank the team’s eighth and final three-pointer of the game to maintain an 11-point lead, and a drive by Jones with 2:31 on the clock put Richmond ahead 55-42.
In the closing two minutes of the third, two points each from Hamilton and Jones, along with a bucket and a free throw by Crowder, made it 62-49.
Carrying that lead over into the fourth, Richmond lapsed and allowed Pinecrest to go on an 11-2 run. A Crowder drive accounted for those two points as the Patriots cut their deficit to 64-60 with 3:19 to go.
Morrison stopped the run by making two of his four free throw attempts after being fouled. He also scored the team’s next three points on a drive and a free throw after Crowder made a crucial steal.
Reaching the double bonus with 59.6 seconds to play, Richmond benefitted from Pinecrest being forced to foul. Hamilton made one free throw and Crowder knocked in a pair with 48.3 seconds to play to make it a 72-64 lead.
Hamilton helped the Patriots warm up the bus when he was fouled again while bringing the ball up the court, resulting in two made free throws with 30.4 seconds on the clock.
Jones capped his big game and the scoring for Richmond when he threw down a breakaway one-handed jam and made two free throws in the closing 15 seconds.
Set to play their final two regular-season games next week, the Raiders (16-6, 6-2 MSC) will host Jack Britt High School (11-10, 3-4 MSC) Monday in a make-up game. Richmond will look to even its season series with the Buccaneers starting at 7:30 p.m.
The Richmond Observer will publish galleries of Friday’s senior night and game photos later this weekend.
