Mepham Boys Basketball Falls Short Against Wheatley

The Mepham boys basketball team took it down to the wire Tuesday, but came up short in a closely fought contest against the visiting Wheatley Wildcats, as a three-point shot at the buzzer to tie bounced off of the rim and spelled a 47-44 loss for the Pirates.

Mepham, led by point guard Kyle Wechsler, had kept it close for three quarters and outscored their opponents 18-13 in the fourth quarter. But the Pirates came up short and fell to 0-5 on the season.

"We had a set inbounds play at the end and executed it," said Wechsler, who finished with 22 points, three assists and four steals. "I got it to the middle of the court, and Jeff Swanson got a decent look. It just didn't go down."

It was a bounce-back win for the 2-2 Wildcats, who had gone 0-2 in conference B-C in early season action. The team was led by quick handed guard Zach Rogers, a strong inside game for Andrew Nourmand, who finished with 13 points, and long range shooting from Adil Husian, who finished with four three-pointers and 12 points.

Husian proved particularly troublesome to the Pirates, who found themselves clawing back to a tie game on numerous occasions, only to find themselves back down moments later thanks to the smooth three-point shooting from the Wildcats' guard.

"Husian's a good shooter from the outside," Pirates head coach Rich Wojcieski said. "But I thought we had it at the end."

In fact Mepham came pretty close to pulling off the comeback. Trailing by no more than eight at any point, the Pirates utilized aggressive work on the boards from Jordan Gilroy, Matt Morrow and Chris Shevins to keep it close.

Mepham pulled even with the Wildcats three minutes into the fourth quarter. At the 5:40 mark, the Pirates led 36-35, but that's when Husain drained a three to give his team the lead. A nice pass from Shevins to Gilroy at 4:50 tied things up again at 38-38, and from there it looked like Mepham had a chance to snatch a win.

For Pirates fans, the last 32.5 seconds on the clock were gripping. Down 44-42, Wechsler found Morrow for a nice pass and he drove to the basket, but failed to convert and left Mepham in a must-foul situation. Wheatley went 3-for-5 from the charity stripe down the stretch, while the Pirates were only able to muster a Gilroy put-back bucket.

With 4.9 left on the clock, Gilroy rebounded the second of two foul shots, setting up a last-second heroic attempt for the tie, but the attempt rattled out and the comeback fell just short.

"We played hard and we played well," Wojcieski said afterward. "A couple of missed free throws, a couple of mental mistakes, was the difference."

"We're playing well in spurts," Wechsler added. "But we've got to put a full game together to get ourselves in the win column."