Redskins Rally Past Buffaloes in Double Overtime
Brock Kappelmann - February 24, 2021 7:28 am
Playing in there first multiple overtime game since 2016, the Liberal Redskins rallied from 11 down twice in the third quarter to beat the Garden City Buffaloes 68-63 in the Big House Tuesday night. Liberal’s defense harassed the Buffaloes into 33 turnovers.
Liberal jumped out to a 13-10 lead after one quarter. The Buffaloes used a 19-9 run to lead Liberal 29-22 in the second quarter before a twisting reverse put back by Izzy Garcia-Rotolo at the end of the first half made it 29-22 Garden City. The Buffaloes bulled their way to leads of 35-24 and 37-26 in the third quarter. The Redskins trimmed the GCHS lead to 39-34 after three. Alex Lopez nailed a three to tie the game at 41-41 with 5:37 to play. Liberal led 42-41 with 4:32 to play. Liberal led 46-42 with 3:15 to play. Garden City took a 48-46 lead. AJ Ramirez knocked down two free throws with 26.9 seconds left to tie the game. It went to overtime for Liberal’s second overtime game of the year (opeing 49-47 OT win at Colby) Liberal jumped ahead 54-50 with 1:31 to play in the first overtime but uncharacteristically missed 3-4 free throws down the stretch. Garden tied tied it and send it to double OT tied at 55-55. Lopez swished a right corner three to begin the second overtime. His left corner three rimmed in to give LHS a 61-57 lead in double OT. Liberal made 25-30 free throws on the night to hold the lead.
Embry Williams had 23 points and was 8-8 at the foul line. AJ Ramirez and Alex Lopez had 14 a piece.
Liberal is 7-12 and 3-4 in the WAC and Garden finishes the regular season 9-7 and 3-5 in the WAC. Liberal hosts Dodge City for Senior Night Thursday night at about 7:45 in the Big House on 1270 and kscbnews.net. Liberal will play sub state at Dodge City Tuesday night at 7.