Three for Three: Hoyt keeps attacking basket in overtime to give Raiders victory

QUINCY — Each time Jake Hoyt darted to the basket, he knew punishment was coming.

“That was pretty much the thought process,” he said. “I knew I had to try to score.”

Hoyt completed one old-fashioned three-point play in the fourth quarter, then made two more in overtime and finished with a career-high 24 points as the Quincy Notre Dame boys basketball team outlasted McCluer 72-66 on Saturday night during the Gully Transportation Shootout at the Pit.

Hoyt only had six points through three quarters. However, as the Raiders held a slim lead and McCluer extended its man-to-man pressure to the full court, Comets defenders hounded the junior guard.

He handled the pressure and attacked the basket. He shot 14 free throws and making 10 in the final 8 1/2 minutes.

Braden Sheffield scored the first basket of overtime for QND. After McCluer’s John Baker missed a free-throw line jumper, Hoyt drove to the basket, hit an acrobatic layup and was fouled. He made the free throw to put QND ahead 66-61.

The Raiders failed to score on their next two possessions. Baker, who had 17 of his 19 points in the second half, hit a 3-pointer to make the score 66-64. However, Hoyt went to the basket again, drew another foul and made the layup. He made the ensuing free throw to put the hosts ahead 69-64.

“Maybe a couple of (the contested layups) are a little iffy if they’re going to go in, but we work on them at practice,” Hoyt said with a smile.

The Comets scored for the last time with 1:29 to play on a pull-up jumper from Jayden Euttrell. Jake Wallingford made a free throw and Hoyt added two more in the final 38 seconds to put the game out of reach.

“I thought Jake just played phenomenal tonight,” Raiders coach Kevin Meyer said. “(McCluer’s) pressure was phenomenal. Nothing was easy. It was easy to say, ‘Just get to the basket,’ and Jake made all those three-point plays, but it also was spacing good spacing from the other guys to recognize it. If he had to pitch it, we had guys to make those shots.”

Hoyt shot all of his free throws on the east basket — his favorite basket in the gym.

“I shoot on that rim every practice,” he sad. “That’s pretty much the only rim I shoot on. It’s the one I share with (Blake) Bozarth. That’s our basket.”

The Raiders took the lead at 20-19 in the second quarter on a reverse layup by Alex Connoyer, and they never trailed again. A 3-pointer by Jackson Stratton beat the halftime buzzer and put QND ahead 31-28 at halftime, and another Stratton 3-pointer started the second-half scoring for the Raiders.

The largest lead was 49-41 early in the fourth quarter after a driving layup by Hoyt. The Comets got within 51-50 after a driving layup by Baker. Hoyt then pushed the lead to 56-50 with a three-point play and a pair of free throws.

A technical foul against Connoyer for slamming the ball to the court after earning a personal foul with 3:19 remaining in the game could have been costly. However, after Terrance Watson made two free throws for the Comets, Baker missed a pair. Dennis Keyes then was whistled for an offensive foul on McCluer’s next possession.

QND failed to put the game away in the final two minutes of regulation, missing five of 10 free throws. The Comets forced overtime when Baker found Carl McCoy for a game-tying layup with 3.8 seconds to play.

The victory over the Comets is the first ever for the Raiders, who had lost two previous meetings.

“It’s a great opportunity for these guys to say we grew up a little bit tonight,” Meyer said.

“They were really good,” Hoyt said of the Comets. “It was just kind of kickstart to the season for us.”

Stratton finished with 13 for the Raiders (2-0), who had 20 turnovers. Wallingford and Connoyer added nine points apiece.