Hinckley-Big Rock outlasts Serena 72-68 in OT to claim regional title

OTTAWA — While watching his players have their pictures taken with the Class 1A Marquette Regional championship plaque on Friday night, Hinckley-Big Rock coach Seth Sanderson took a deep breath, held it for a second, then let go a huge exhale with shrugging shoulders.

“Oh my gosh. What a game,” he said.

The subsectional No. 2-seeded Royals outscored No. 6 Serena 11-7 in overtime to post a 72-68 triumph at Bader Gymnasium.

H-BR (25-8) advances to the Somonauk Sectional semifinals at 7 p.m. on Wednesday against Skokie Ida Crown.

H-BR led 17-7 after the opening quarter, 29-16 at the intermission, and by 17 a minute into the third quarter before the Huskers — behind an 18-point explosion, including four straight treys by Payton Twait — battled back to take one-point leads in the final minute of regulation.

“We were up there early in the third and feeling pretty good with where we were at,” Sanderson said. “Then Twait hits a couple 3s to cut it to 11 and then a couple more and all of a sudden, it’s a three-point game.

“I have all the respect in the world for Serena and coach [Dain] Twait and I knew they were going to throw everything at us, and they did.”

Serena (18-16) led 61-59 with 12 seconds left after a free throw by Beau Raikes, but H-BR senior Martin Ledbetter — who finished with a game-high 24 points and 18 rebounds — hit a 10-foot jumper with two seconds left to send the game to overtime.

“This means a lot,” said Ledbetter, who also had four assists and a pair of blocks. “We worked very hard to get here and it’s awesome to be able to hold that plaque. The past few weeks we’ve been playing really well and just kept things going tonight. We stuck together, that was the key.

“I’m proud of our younger guys. They really stepped up tonight. Those last two minutes of overtime felt like forever, but the guys just refused to not win this game.”

Serena took the lead early in the extra session on a rebound basket by Cash Raikes, but Ledbetter followed with a pair of 10-foot jumpers to make it 66-63.

Raikes then swished two free throws and a long triple around a drive by H-BR’s Luke Badal and the contest was tied at 68 with 48 seconds left.

Royals senior Max Hintzsche then was fouled and made two free throws with 37 seconds left, and after a Serena miss, Alex Casanas was fouled on the rebound. His two charity tosses with five seconds remaining sewed up the win.

“Martin was Martin, so our star did his thing, but we also had Max, Jacob (Orin), Luke and Alex really step up for us when we needed them to,” Sanderson said.

After Ledbetter, Badal had 18 points and four rebounds, Orin 10 points and three assists and Hintzsche seven points and three steals. H-BR finished 28 of 54 (52%) from the field and won the rebound battle 35-31.

Twait led Serena with 20 points, Cash Raikes had 17, including all seven Serena points in overtime, Beau Raikes 16 points, 12 rebounds and four steals, Blake Hjerpe eight points and seven rebounds, and Hendrix Johnson seven points and three rebounds. Serena went 23 of 52 (44%) from the floor.

“Games like tonight I think every coach will tell you is why we do it,” Dain Twait said. “These are the games you work hard to hopefully give your players a chance to have the experience. My guys did everything I could ask of them and more. We played an outstanding second half and OT, but just came up a couple of plays short.

“[Payton] has been struggling from the three-point line lately and I’ve been on him to drive more, but I could just sense when that first one went in that his confidence was sky-high. Momentum is a real thing and once we grabbed it early in the third quarter, we made it very difficult for Hinckley-Big Rock to take it from us.

“We just couldn’t get far enough away from them.”