Braves just miss longshot weekend road sweep

It’s never easy winning back-to-back games on the road.

Some might call it a longshot, in fact.

For the La Conner Braves, that proved doubly true at 1A Nooksack Valley on Saturday.

Coming off a near flawless 68-13 romp of NW2B foe Cedar Park Christian the night before, La Conner was poised to pull off that longshot.

Trouble was, the Pioneers got there first, thanks to a Hail Mary three-quarters length trey that closed out a wild, wacky first half.

The hosts built upon the momentum generated from the desperation heave by Connor Beard — and the drama associated with it — to stake out a 60-47 non-league triumph.

The key sequence of events started innocently enough. La Conner’s Jeffrey Johnson was fouled on the offensive glass with five-tenths of a second to go before halftime. Braves head coach Scott Novak was assured by a game official that Nooksack would not have enough time to get off a shot following Johnson’s free throws.

So Novak pulled the rest of his players into the backcourt to avoid committing a foul at the buzzer.

Nooksack inbounded the ball to Beard, who wound up and flung the ball into the basket.

Everyone in the gym was surprised. But no one more so than Novak, especially when the shot was ruled good.

“I had our players go into the locker room while I tried to get a clarification from the officials,” said Novak, who had little luck pleading his case that he had been told earlier it wasn’t possible to get a shot off with only a fraction of a second on the clock.

Actually, Novak had some luck. Bad luck, it turns out.

He was slapped with a technical foul for debating the issue, meaning not only that Beard’s three-pointer stood, but that Nooksack would receive two additional foul shots and possession of the ball to start the second half.

“I’m not saying that call cost us the game,” Novak said afterward, “but it meant that we ended up playing behind six to eight points most of the second half.”

In the end, the issue wasn’t so much what Novak said. Instead it was the fact the referees spoke so little among themselves, apparently not aware one of them had erred in telling Novak beforehand that Nooksack had too little time to launch a shot before halftime.

Nooksack, with Beard scoring a game-high 26 points, broke a three-year losing streak to the Braves.

La Conner, which fell to 2-2 on the young campaign, was led by the 15 points of Budda Luna. Scott Lindeman and Cameron Hansen were in double figures as well, finishing with 13 and 11 points, respectively.

Lindeman also dished off six assists for the Braves, who resumed their NW2B slate late Tuesday against Orcas.

Novak anticipated a tough matchup with the Vikings but was happy to be back in conference play.

“We played an excellent game at Cedar Park,” he stressed. “It could’ve been a close game, but we didn’t want that to happen.”

Lindeman paced La Conner with 17 points — including four treys — five assists, and a pair of rebounds. All but three of his points came before intermission.

Hansen tallied 14 points, hitting twice from beyond the three-point arc. He also recorded two assists and three steals.

Ten La Conner players landed on the point parade at Cedar Park, indicative of the type of scoring balance Novak forecast for his club prior to the start of the season.

The Braves continue to log miles this Saturday, Dec. 19, with a key non-league test at Mount Baker.

“This should be another big test for us,” said Novak. “They are talented and have a lot of size.

“This,” he added, “could be like our Nooksack Valley game.”

Hopefully without the anguish of giving up a controversial three-point shot.