GRAVETTE -- Jeremy Mueller split the defense and laid in a soft finger roll just before he tumbled to the court.
The Farmington junior is not usually among the top scoring options for the Cardinals, but on Friday night every one of his 14 points were huge.
Mueller's lay up with 5.6 seconds left was the difference as Farmington escaped with a 66-64 win over Gravette in a key 4A-1 Conference boys game.
"Mueller did a great job of taking control of the game," Farmington coach Beau Thompson said. "This whole team just has a lot of heart."
Gravette had a chance to tie or win the game at the end, but Terence Pierce's off-balance 3-pointer from the left wing rimmed out at the buzzer.
Mueller's play was especially big considering Farmington's leading scorer, Matt Thomas, picked up his third foul, then was hit with a technical foul with 2 minutes, 47 seconds left in the third quarter. Thomas went to the bench and did not return. Mueller scored 12 of his 14 points in the final 1:16 of the third quarter, including a pull-up jumper at the buzzer to give Farmington (12-8, 9-1) its first lead of the game.
Gravette (15-6, 7-3) exploded out of the gate as post Otto Troutner scored eight first quarter points and the Lions grabbed a 19-4 lead and led 21-8 at the end of the first quarter.
Farmington slowly chipped away at the deficit, but Pierce was able to keep the Cardinals at bay by hitting all seven free-throw attempts in the quarter. His two free throws with 2:25 left in the half gave the Lions a 37-24 lead. Pierce finished with a game-high 26 points.
The 13-point margin evaporated in the third quarter as Farmington opened the second half with Skyler Barnes' 3-pointer that ignited a 10-2 run that tied the game at 39-39 on Thomas' jumper. It was a dogfight the rest of the way.
Troutner, who did not score in the second half, picked up his fourth foul with 6:31 left in the third quarter on a double-foul. He was forced to the bench for the remainder of the quarter and later fouled out.
"That was huge," Gravette coach Dustin Peters said. "They were mugging my post player. But he's got to be smarter than that."
Farmington missed some key free throws late in the game, including a pair of misses by Barnes, who was playing in his first game in several weeks after battling mononucleosis. His two misses with under 25 seconds left and the Cardinals leading 64-61 proved to be huge as Pierce was fouled on a 3-point attempt with 18.4 seconds left. Pierce drained all three free throws to tie the game at 64-64.
But Mueller drove the floor and hit the biggest shot of the game, and Pierce's late shot came up just short.
"The bottom line is they kicked our butts on the offensive glass," Peters said. "They went after it and we didn't."
The Cardinals also got major contributions from their bench, especially Blaise Albright. But Thompson said the key was his team's composure after getting down early.
"Blaise got some big rebounds for us and some big stick backs," Thompson said. "We talked before the game started that there was going to be runs. We talked about sticking to our game plan and not letting the score affect the way we play offensively. I thought we did a pretty good job of that."
GIRLS
FARMINGTON 64
GRAVETTE 26
Tahlon Hopkins scored a game-high 16 points as league-leading Farmington rolled to a mercy-rule win.
Haley Maxwell added 12 points for Farmington (17-4, 9-1) and Tichina Scales scored 10.
Sam Pruitt led Gravette (4-15, 2-8) with 8 points and Kylee Davis added 7.
Sports on 02/05/2014