BANGOR, Maine — The Hampden Academy boys basketball team was faced with two challenges midway through the second half of Tuesday night’s clash with Bangor at Red Barry Gymnasium.
First came the rival Rams, who used a perimeter-oriented 18-3 run to build a 13-point cushion with 3:39 left in the third quarter. Then came Broncos coach Russ Bartlett, who called timeout at that point to express his displeasure with his team’s performance.
Hampden responded to the latter oration to overcome the former challenge, as the Broncos rose defensively to hold Bangor without a field goal over the final 2:44 of regulation play and throughout the four-minute overtime to salvage a 58-50 victory.
“Sometimes we need Coach to give us the motivation we need,” said Jake Black, who scored a game-high 15 points as Hampden improved its record to 8-1 with its eighth consecutive victory — three coming in overtime.
“That’s what we needed tonight, a kick in the butt.”
Hampden trailed by as much as 36-23 after a 3-pointer by Bangor’s Trey Kenny midway through the third quarter, but Bartlett then called a full timeout and the Broncos responded to that motivational offering by outscoring the Rams 15-5 over the next five minutes to draw within 41-38 after a steal and drive by Nick Gilpin with 6:35 left in the game.
“I explained to the kids that they had three minutes to impress me with their effort or we were going to make subs and the guys who haven’t been playing much were going to finish this game,” said Bartlett. “Then it was like the light went on for us and we played with a lot more energy and passion from there.
“We started to attack more rather than be flat-footed and we became the aggressor, and that was the difference in us getting ourselves back into the game and having a chance to win it at the end.”
But Bangor (4-5) refused to go away quietly. An Andrew Hillier 3-pointer restored the Rams to a six-point edge, and they were still up by five at 48-43 after a Justin Smith layup with 2:44 left in the final period.
That turned out to be Bangor’s last field goal of the night.
Hampden’s Conary Moore scored on a drive with 1:58 to go and Black nailed his third 3-pointer from the right of the key off a skip pass from Gilpin with 1:03 remaining to tie the game, which went to overtime after each team came up empty on its final possession of regulation.
“Give Black credit,” said Bangor coach Ed Kohtala. “I felt like our defense was tired at that point and Gilpin was shooting layups, so we went zone and he hit the three.”
The overtime belonged to Hampden’s defense, which induced turnovers on Bangor’s first four possessions before it yielded a single shot by the Rams.
Black gave the Broncos the lead for good with a 15-foot jumper after Gilpin tipped an offensive rebound to him.
And when Bangor was soon forced to foul to stop the clock, Hampden went a perfect 8-for-8 from the line to put the game away.
Gilpin, limited to two points through three quarters, finished with 14 points, seven rebounds, seven assists and five steals for Hampden, while Brendan McIntyre added 11 points and seven rebounds and Moore finished with 10 points and six boards.
Hillier, who scored Bangor’s first eight points as the Rams built an 8-2 lead en route to a 23-20 halftime edge, finished with a team-high 14 points. Kenny had 12 points and eight rebounds, while Justin Smith also scored 12 points and Karl Gurschick had 10.
Point guard Ethan Dorman grabbed a game-high nine rebounds for the Rams.
