‘I just kind of had my fingers crossed’: QND outlasts CSE as showdown comes down to final shot

CAMP POINT, Ill. — Karly Peters diplomatically handled the question of whether Tristan Pieper fouled her.

“I don’t know,” said Peters, a senior guard on the Central-Southeastern girls basketball team. “I mean, I think so, but it doesn’t really matter now.”

With Quincy Notre Dame leading CSE 37-34 and three seconds left in Tuesday’s West Central Conference game in Central’s North Gym, Peters came off a screen from Lauren Miller and caught an inbounds pass from Amanda Stephens on the right wing.

As Peters turned to shoot a potential game-tying 3-pointer, Pieper, the 5-foot-10 QND junior post player, challenged the shot and appeared to make contact with Peters, but none of the three officials blew the whistle. Miller rebounded the air ball and laid it in at the buzzer, officially giving the Raiders a 37-36 victory.

Pieper could breathe easier when she didn’t hear a whistle.

“I was pretty relieved because it doesn’t feel good if the whistle gets blown and you’re the one that fouls someone at the buzzer,” Pieper said. “I’m glad they didn’t blow the whistle.”

Pieper cracked a wry smile when asked about the no-call.

“I mean, I got a lot of the ball, but I might have gotten her arm before the shot,” Pieper said.

Raiders coach Eric Orne could not tell if Pieper fouled Peters, but he thanked his lucky stars nonetheless.

“I just kind of had my fingers crossed,” Orne said. “It was a back and forth battle. A lot of things were 50-50 both ways. I thought it was a well-officiated game. Sometimes you get lucky, and sometimes you don’t.”

Panthers coach Matt Long did not blame the result on the officials not calling a foul.

“It doesn’t matter,” Long said. “We made enough mistakes during the game, and so did Notre Dame, that for either of us it probably shouldn’t have come down to that last possession. We’re not going to dwell on that.”

Two missed free throws by Jenna Durst with 17 seconds left gave the Panthers a chance on that final possession, one in which Orne said the Raiders were trying to foul before CSE could get off a shot. QND had two fouls to give before sending CSE to the free-throw line.

“(The plan was to) foul without them shooting,” Orne said. “We were actually doing that with eight to 10 seconds to go and didn’t seem like we were getting the call. A couple times they went down the lane and I thought we hit them, but that’s one thing you have to practice a little more than we have, and that’s on me in that situation. We have to practice that situation because it’s unique.”

In the midst of that scramble to try to foul, CSE’s Lexi Niekamp missed a 3-pointer from the right corner with 10 seconds left. Peters grabbed the offensive rebound and passed the ball to Stephens, who gave it back to Niekamp. As Niekamp tried to pass it back to Stephens, QND’s Ari Buehler stuck her right leg out and got a piece of the ball, resulting in a kicked ball violation and the subsequent inbounds play on the right sideline that preceded Peters’ game-tying bid.

After Orne called timeout, Long drew up a play anticipating QND would foul.

“We thought they’d foul as soon as we got it inbounds,” Long said. “That’s why we wanted the ball to go directly from the inbounds to the shooter. We ran a couple decoys to try to get them to jump. It was there. She just didn’t get squared up and get a clean look at it. That’s the way it goes.”

Until Miller’s layup, the Panthers had not scored since Peters tied the game at 34 on a 3-pointer with 4:10 left, CSE’s first points of the fourth quarter. 

A minute later, QND’s Sage Stratton rattled in a triple from the top of the key to give the Raiders a 37-34 lead.

“I was wide open, so I thought I might as well just take it,” Stratton said.

After a Niekamp missed 3-pointer on CSE’s ensuing possession, Buehler fumbled Pieper’s outlet pass out of bounds, giving the ball back to the Panthers with 2:25 left. Peters missed a 3-pointer from the left wing, Niekamp missed a floater along the baseline, and Peters missed a putback within a 15-second span. QND’s Ellie Bozarth finally grabbed the rebound for QND with 1:40 left, and the Raiders went into clock management mode.

Orne called timeout with 1:20 left, and the Panthers still had two fouls to give. The Raiders played keep-away until Peters gave the first of those fouls with 47.4 seconds left. Peters fouled Stratton 25 seconds later, then Miller fouled Durst, sending Durst to the line for two free throws, which she missed.

Stratton said the Raiders’ collectedness under pressure allowed them to chew up 1:23 of clock.

“We work on those last-second scenarios in practice, just moving the ball,” Stratton said. “We work on passing it over traps so we don’t get the foul and can kill more time. They’re a really run-and-jump team, so we were able to just get around them.”

Buehler said pulling back the reins can be difficult in those late-game situations, but the Raiders possess the composure to do so.

“It’s one of those things where you literally just have to be patient,” Buehler said. “If we hold it, stay calm and just keep moving the ball, it’s going to be better than trying to chuck up a shot.”

Even though a shot clock could have saved the Panthers an extra possession — or multiple — Long is not a shot clock proponent.

“I’ve always been against the shot clock,” Long said. “I think it takes too much out of the chess game. Get up and guard. It’s that simple.”

The last two meetings between the Raiders (15-0) and Panthers (16-3) have been decided by a combined five points, and neither team eclipsed 40 points in either game. QND defeated CSE 35-31 on Dec. 18, 2023.

“Eric and I talked about it before the game. We knew it was going to be a war coming in and it was going to be a street fight. That’s what it turned out to be,” said Long, whose team is ranked 15th in Class 2A. “Tonight they had the edge on us, and things like that happen, but it made us a better ball team playing them tonight, win or lose.”

With QND in Class 3A this season, Tuesday’s one-point affair is guaranteed to be the final game between these teams this season.

“This was always going to be a battle,” said Orne, whose Raiders sit at No. 6 in the Class 3A. “Just two good teams locking horns.”

It’s a battle Long believes the Panthers will learn more from than any other they’ve engaged in this season. The Panthers came back from multiple 10-point deficits in the second quarter to take a 31-30 lead by the end of the third quarter.

“We grew up a lot tonight,” Long said. “It was maybe the best game of the year for us. Even though we got beat, it may help us more than any game we’ve played.”