Melique Hambrick admitted he didn't call "bank."
No matter. When the desperation shot by Tyner's junior guard - just before the final buzzer - ricocheted off the glass and through the net, the only thing that mattered was that he had lifted his team to a dramatic 53-52 win over Red Bank in Tuesday night's Region 3-AA semifinals at East Ridge.
"During that last timeout I told the kids in the huddle that we needed somebody to go do something special," said Rams coach E'Jay Ward, who admitted he already feared his team was going to have its season ended in the region semifinals for a second straight year. "I haven't slept good for the last year just from thinking about the way our season ended last year. It's just a relief right now.
"Melique is a tough, battle-tested kid. It would've been easy for him to get in his feelings after I took him out of the game in the third quarter and chewed him out for taking a bad shot. But he kept his head in the game, he took the coaching and came back in ready to make a play."
Howard beat Brainerd 69-57 in Tuesday's earlier semifinal, setting up a fourth showdown with the Rams, who have won all three previous meetings, in Thursday's region championship at East Ridge.
The fourth quarter between Tyner and Red Bank had had six lead changes, and when Lucas Brown connected on two free throws with seven seconds remaining, the Lions held a two-point advantage. As Hambrick looked for a teammate to pass to, he bobbled the ball but regained control just in time to get the shot off just before the buzzer sounded.
"I knew in my head that most of the time had ticked off and I needed to just take the shot," Hambrick said of his only points of the game. "This is an amazing feeling. I've never hit a game-winner like that. We were down but this just shows that we're not backing down from nobody."
Red Bank built a nine-point lead late in the third quarter, but Tyner fed off its full-court press to put together a 12-0 run spanning the final minute of the period into the first two minutes of the fourth.
Rams senior post Kobe Smith scored 17 of his game-high 25 points in the second half, and no other Tyner player accounted for more than six. The Lions were led by Brown's 16.
Tyner’s Melique Hambrick banks in the game-winning 3 at the buzzer. Rams with a dramatic 53-52 win over Red Bank in the region semis #bestofpreps pic.twitter.com/xhPldy2IbQ
— Stephen Hargis (@StephenHargis) March 4, 2020
Howard led throughout its game but struggled to build a comfortable margin until the final five minutes. After Brainerd closed to within four, the Hustlin' Tigers responded with a 13-5 run to claim their fourth win over their rival this season.
With junior post Kerrick Thorne battling foul trouble the whole game, it was sophomore point guard Xavier Fisher who carried the scoring load, making three 3-pointers and 11 of 14 free throws for 26 points, including seven in the late scoring run.
"Fisher has been coming on slowly all season, but ever since the postseason started he's been lights-out," Howard coach James Talley said. "He's been waiting on his time, and when it came he stepped up big for us.
"Kerrick is our anchor. As he goes, we go, and we were struggling without him. But Fisher has a high basketball IQ, and he came in and played really smart when we needed him to take over."
Contact Stephen Hargis at shargis@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6293. Follow him on Twitter @StephenHargis.