Boys Basketball: Plainfield East escapes Oswego

Updated: January 27, 2012 10:48PM

Sometimes the last option gets to be the first.

When Plainfield East took the ball out of bounds with 18.6 seconds to go and tied 63-all with Oswego, guard Jawan Straughter was the last guy expected to take the game-winning shot. But when he found the ball in his hands 10 seconds later, he made the most of it, putting in a layup and a subsequent free throw with 3.9 seconds left to give the Bengals a 66-63 win.

Straughter, who finished the night with seven points, took it up on the left side of the basket and drew the foul against Miles Simelton and canned the free throw after an Oswego timeout.

“The play just broke down, I went to the basket to try and get up a shot and get fouled,” Straughter said. “I saw the opening and I took it, I focused on the basket and just tried to get the ball up (to draw a foul).”

His heorics were necessary after Oswego battled back from a 16-point third quarter deficit. The Panthers had trailed by doubled digits for most of the first three quarters after Brian Bennett scored 13 of his 23 points in the first quarter to give the Bengals a 26-13 lead.

That lead was still eight (54-46) a the end of the third, but Oswego opened the quarter on a quick 6-0 run and finally tied the game at 61-all when Ryan West (23 points) dropped in a layup with 1:56 to play.

After Austin Robinson scored on a layup 30 seconds later, West had a long three to give Oswego the lead but missed. But Elliott McGaughy did tie the game when he stole an East inbounds pass and dropped in a bucked with 38 seconds to go.

After Straughter’s three-point play, Oswego ran one more play to tie but Danny Mangers’ good look from the left wing just missed at the buzzer.

“We played together and made plays at the end, and I’m happy for this team,” East coach Branden Adkins said. “If (Mangers) gets his feet set he usually makes those. We got lucky at the end, Mangers got an easy look and we have to do a little better in those situations.”

It was the second time this week the Panthers had to claw their way back from a double-digit deficit in the third quarter. They trailed by 14 to Plainfield South on Tuesday before falling by seven, and just ran out of time Friday against the top team in the Southwest Prairie Conference.

“As the game went on we battled more and believed more, and you saw that in the way we were playing,” said Oswego coach Kevin Schnable. “Our kids faced a deficit again, and we had two options: quit or fight. We have to take the good with the bad, and the good is we played the right way and lost to a darn good team.”

Mack Brown had 14 points and Myles Walters 10 for Plainfield East, now 16-1 overall and 7-0 in SPC play. McGaughy had 21 points and Mangers 11 points and eight boards for Oswego, now 9-9 and 3-4.

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