With time winding down and the Greenwood basketball team locked in a battle with District 14 rival Bowling Green, Isaiah Summers called game.

The senior forward’s runner on the left side with 00.2 seconds left was the difference, giving Greenwood a thrilling 84-82 victory over the Purples on Monday at Greenwood High School. The Gators scored the final five points in a 17.5-second span to spark a wild celebration on court and secure back-to-back wins over Bowling Green for the first time since winning seven straight from 2006-08.

“I was trying to get there as fast as I could,” Summers said. “It means a lot. It means we can beat teams like that and we can get through those tough moments. It’s big for us to let people know that we are here and we’re not bad. You see that Bowling Green team beat Central. They’re not bad. Anybody can beat anybody and the fact we beat them twice, it feels great.”

With the win, Greenwood (17-4 overall, 3-2 District 14) is guaranteed at least a top-three seed in the district tournament. The Gators are still in the hunt for the No. 1 seed, which will come down to Friday’s district finale at Warren Central.

“We’ve got a list of goals remaining on the year and this was the first one – get locked out of not being in that 1-4 game,” Greenwood coach Will McCoy said. “We don’t know what’s going to happen mathematically moving forward, but we know we have avoided that. The 1 and the 2 is still up for grabs. We are going to go over there Friday night and try to continue to play fearless basketball and team basketball. If we can pull that one off, we will just let the math play its course with the RPI stuff and be ready for whoever we get lined up against.”

Greenwood won 71-61 when the teams met last month at Bowling Green, but the Purples were coming in riding momentum after a win by Warren Central in its previous game on Jan. 22. Bowling Green (11-10, 1-4) started slow, but was able to settle in and take the Gators to the limit in Monday’s rematch.

The Gators jumped out to a 15-5 lead in the first four minutes, before BG was able to chip away and trim the deficit to 23-21 at the end of one.

Braylon Anderson’s 3-pointer gave the Purples a 29-27 advantage, with Bowling Green holding a 40-38 lead at halftime. The Purples scored the first four points in the second half to push the margin to six. Bowling Green maintained that edge until the final seconds of the third when Ethan York hit a pair of free throws to push Greenwood back in front 59-58.

Greenwood was able to extend its advantage to 73-68 on a three-point play by York with 4:37 left before the Purples regained the lead with a 9-2 spurt that made the score 77-75 three minutes later.

After Greenwood tied it back up, a 3 from Tre Thomas made the score 80-77. Greenwood got a bucket to trim it to one and had a chance to take the lead, but a steal and layup from Anthony Davis extended the lead to 82-79 with 24 seconds remaining.

The Gators got a free throw from Martell Tuttle, but he missed the second attempt. York secured the offensive rebound and was fouled – hitting two free throws that tied the score 82-all with 15.9 seconds remaining.

That set the stage for the wild finish. BG had a chance at the win, missing a shot in the paint as time was winding down. York secured the rebound and passed it to Tuttle, who found Summers streaking down the left side for the game winner.

“They just didn’t quit,” McCoy said. “There was no quit. I was so proud of Ethan. Everybody will remember Isaiah Summers’ shot, but Ethan York called a timeout when we didn’t want it called. He threw the ball out of bounds underneath the rim and gave them the two that put them up. To come down as a sophomore and get the free throw rebound, then knock down two free throws with hundreds of people staring and chanting at you – that was huge. Isaiah doesn’t have a chance to make that play if Ethan doesn’t make his plays.”

Tuttle led the Greenwood offense with 20 points. Summers had 17 points, with York adding 14 points and Brayden Kennedy finishing with 10 points.

Davis finished with a game-high 21 points to lead the Purples. Hudson Akins scored 18 points, with Anderson adding 14 and Thomas finishing with 13 points. BG shot 52.5% from the field, but finished 9-for-17 from the free-throw line.

“An offensive rebound wins the game,” Bowling Green coach D.G. Sherrill said. “We hit free throws, we win the game. We had opportunities and chances. We really did. I’m proud of my team. I think we are really getting a lot better. Greenwood is top three in the region and look where we are. I think we are right there on everybody’s heels with what we’ve had to come back with this year. We replaced everything. I was just really pleased with our grit and performance. It was just a number of little things that could have won the game for us.”

With the loss, Bowling Green needs a win at South Warren on Friday and help to avoid the No. 4 seed in the district tournament.

“We have to beat South on Friday,” Sherrill said. “We know that is a must-win. Tonight would have really helped. We kind of gave one away tonight. I’m not taking anything away from Greenwood. We had that thing in the bag and we kind of gave it back there at the end.”

BGHS 21 19 18 24 – 82

GHS 23 15 21 25 – 84

BG – An. Davis 21, Akins 18, Anderson 14, Thomas 13, Muhire 7, Dotson 6, Ar. Davis 3.

GHS – Tuttle 20, Summers 17, York 14, Kennedy 10, Sampson 8, Meador 6, Huff 6, Graves 2. Tabor 1.

Girls

Bowling Green 51, Greenwood 28

The Lady Purples wrapped up the top seed in the District 14 Tournament with a strong defensive effort and a balanced offense.

“That’s been a goal all season,” Bowling Green coach Calvin Head said. “It was definitely a goal today leading up to this. We were able to concentrate and focus on what it would take to do that. Defensively we did a very good job tonight and we did some things offensively that helped us free some people up too.”

Bowling Green (10-9 overall, 5-0 District 14) led most of the way, with an 8-3 surge at the end of the half providing some separation that gave the Lady Purples a 27-18 advantage.

The margin grew to 39-22 by the end of the third with Bowling Green steadily adding to the lead in the final period.

Eleven Lady Purples scored in the win. Jooniper Strow led the way with 11 points. Maddie Davenport added 10 points, while Carli Smith – starting in place of Amayah Brown, who missed the game due to illness – chipped in nine points and four rebounds.

“It was a collective effort offensively,” Head said. “That’s what we need. We’ve got to get production from different players. We just can’t be two kids, three kids. In this situation it has to be seven or eight of us to put some points on the scoreboard.”

Anslee Hendrix led Greenwood (9-10, 3-2) with 10 points, while Molly Spidel added nine points and seven rebounds.

BGHS 12 15 12 12 – 51

GHS 8 10 4 6 – 28

BG – Strow 11, Davenport 10, Smith 9, Smith 6, Woods 4, Pratt 2, Galloway 2, Logan 2, Ware 2, Hall 2, Graves 1.

GHS – Hendrix 10, Spidel 9, Morrison 5, Buser 2, Tandy 1, Wilcutt 1.