Many high school basketball players might never hit a single buzzer-beater in their career. Hermon senior guard Carter Wiggin had two in the same game on Tuesday.
Wiggin came up clutch at the end of both the second and third quarters in Hermon’s 67-36 win over John Bapst, with a deep two-pointer just before half giving his Hawks some added momentum after a tight start to the game.
Wiggin jumped and caught a pass near the three-point line as time expired in the first half and, almost in one motion, heaved the ball toward the hoop before falling to the ground. The ball banked off the glass and in for a highlight-reel ending to the half.
“That’s the only thing that I could think about was, ‘Catch it and shoot it,'” Wiggin said after the Hermon victory. “That’s All I had time for.”
And Wiggin wasn’t done there. After the Hawks put some distance between them and the John Bapst Crusaders in the third quarter, Wiggin provided yet another buzzer-beater at the end of that period.
With his team in transition again in the final seconds of the third, a loose ball bounced to Wiggin near the baseline. He quickly scooped it up and skied it high in the air. It flew over the outstretched arms of a defender and straight in the hoop.
That gave the senior two buzzer-beaters in back to back quarters, which is more than he can remember having all season a year ago.
“I think last year I had one, maybe two in the whole year,” Wiggin said.
You can watch both of those shots here courtesy of video from WHOU.live.
Both he and Hermon coach Mark Reed agreed that the shot just before halftime gave the home atmosphere a boost on Tuesday.
“I think it was great for the energy of the people watching the game, because it was exciting,” Reed said.
That applied to the players as well, according to Wiggin.
“I think the energy helped a lot. Instead of going into halftime kind of low, we were up,” he said. We were up and we were ready to go when we came back out.”
As Reed said, one buzzer-beater can be rare enough for a team each season, let alone two in as many quarters.
“You know, it’s funny. You go a whole season and maybe don’t get one of those,” Reed said. “But it was nice to get a couple of them today to fall for us and go our way. It’s just one of those things where you — right place, right time, pick up a loose ball. Don’t have any time to think about it, and you get one to go.”
Those two plays ended up being exclamation points in a mostly comfortable game for the top team in Class B North, though John Bapst came out of the gate to earn an early lead in the first quarter.
A flurry of offensive rebounds and nine quick points from Hermon senior Brody Hurd at the very end of the first quarter and start of the second helped steady the course for the Hawks, who moved to 6-1 on the year with the win. That run from Hurd included a big 3-pointer to close out the first quarter and several impressive jumpers in the lane.
“That was a good stretch by him,” Reed said. “It’s funny, he’s been a good leader for us, and sometimes defers too much. We’re working on him being a little bit more engaged, more often. So it was a good stretch to see him kind of be a little bit more assertive for us.”
Hurd looked plenty assertive as he hauled in offensive rebounds and knocked down shot after shot. He finished with a game high 15 points. Wiggin finished with 12, and fellow senior Mason Kinney had 11.
“I really am happy with stretches of the game, with how hard we play,” Reed said about his team’s effort so far this season. “The challenge is always getting a team to play that way for 32 minutes. I thought we had great energy off our bench today, and I think that we’ve been in a stretch of games where it’s been really great to develop some of our depth.”
Reed said his team’s half court defense and effort rebounding will continue to be keys as the season moves forward.
Jaxson Sockbeson and Kam Weymouth led the scoring for John Bapst on Tuesday with eight points each.
Video courtesy of WHOU.live, which provides live broadcast coverage of games and other community events for its subscribers.