Mercer Island’s Rainer McDonald drilled a 3-pointer in the waning seconds of double overtime to defeat Redmond, 71-68, on Tuesday night in a 3A KingCo boys basketball thriller.
Redmond got the ball back with 2.3 seconds left in the second overtime, but couldn’t cash in and fell just short on its home court.
“It was a battle,” said Redmond coach Todd Rubin. “Both teams played super hard. It’s a rough one to lose, that’s for sure.”
Redmond’s Devon La Pierre said it was a memorable game to play in: “I’ve never been in an overtime basketball game before, let alone a double overtime basketball game. It was pretty thrilling and intense. Probably everybody in the game is sore and tired. It was a long game, a physical game.”
Rubin added that when one team made a mistake, the other squad took advantage of the opportunity to tack on points.
Mercer Island’s Shain Scott led all scorers with 23 points and his teammate Griffin Emanuels added 12 points.
Tops for Redmond was La Pierre with 16 points, followed by David Shtukin with 14 points and Aleks Bober with 13 points.
Redmond’s Maclain Forseth drained a pair of crucial free throws with 10.5 seconds left to knot the score at 68-68 in double OT. He converted four free throws in the final frame.
The score was tied 57-57 at the end of regulation. Mercer Island nearly won it in the first overtime, but Redmond’s Kevin Gordon scored on a putback to tie the game at 62-62 with 3.2 seconds left to force another OT.
Redmond (1-1 in league, 1-2 overall) led 26-20 at halftime and 42-41 after three quarters. Mercer Island (2-1 league, 2-2 overall) outscored Redmond 16-15 in the fourth quarter to send the game into overtime.
“It was a good game for us to have early in the season against a good team that’s supposed to be at the top of the league,” Rubin said. “We’ve got to find consistency and lots of energy on defense every single game.”
La Pierre said the team needs to work on the little things, like sinking free throws and avoiding making turnovers.
“We need to always be striving to push the game out of hand for them (opponents),” he said.
Redmond will next play at Sammamish (0-3 league, 0-4 overall) at 8:30 p.m. on Friday.
