East Liverpool’s Dre’Keim Abercrombie shoots over Beaver Local’s Tucker McElroy and Luke Rettos on Wednesday at Beaver Local High School.

CALCUTTA — Beaver Local’s boys’ basketball team proved Wednesday night there’s never a hill too tall to climb.

Missing multi-talented 6-7 first team All-Ohio center Owen Hill — who is out with a foot injury — Beaver Local rallied the troops and pulled out a 51-49 win over arch-rival East Liverpool before a jam-packed, spirited crowd in the Beavers’ gym.

“It feels amazing, we didn’t have Owen Hill tonight, first time without him, but we fought through adversity and we ended up with a win,” said Beaver Local’s Matt Anderson, who led the winners with 20 points, including hitting the front end of two free throws in the final 23 seconds which lifted the Beavers to the win.

“Overall, this is an incredible team win,” said Beaver Local head coach Nick Miller. “The atmosphere was awesome. That kid (Anderson) is a rock.”

“Matthew Anderson was great tonight,” lauded East Liverpool head coach Kade Reynolds. “He was composed and got downhill and scored when he needed to.”

Miller said his team rallied in Hill’s absence.

“Normally when you lose a big, critical role player, your team sometimes comes out flat, but our practice yesterday was awesome,” explained the Beaver Local head coach. “The kids were fired up and a big shout out to Tucker McElroy tonight. He doesn’t get the minutes every night but he played big-time minutes tonight and had a dozen rebounds and none bigger than the last couple in the fourth quarter.”

Following Anderson in the scoring column were Aiden Dray with nine points, Nick McKenzie with eight markers, including a key fourth-quarter bucket, Peyton Cowdery finished with six, including both of the Beavers’ three-pointers in the game, and McElroy and Luke Rettos had four points each.

“Beaver’s tough, man,” said Reynolds. “They showed tonight they’re not a one-man show without Owen and I hope the kid gets healthy. They’ve got some seniors on that team that can really play.”

Leading East Liverpool and taking game scoring honors was standout Dre’Keim Abercrombie with 23 points, while guard Dre Brown had seven, Javan Dawson finished with six markers, Tyler Kirby had five and Jayce Douglas ended with four points.

“To hold a team like that to under 50 points without your big guy is a tall task,” said Miller.

With the win, Beaver Local improved to 12-2 and a perfect 8-0 in the Buckeye 8.

“I think tonight wrapped up the Buckeye 8 North, we just put ourselves in the Buckeye 8 championship game,” said Miller. “But we had a goal to go undefeated in the Buckeye 8 North, so that’s another notch on the belt Friday night (when the Beavers play Brooke).”

With the setback, East Liverpool is now 7-5 and 5-3 in the Buckeye 8.

“They (the Beavers) did what they had to do down the stretch and our youth showed,” said Reynolds. “We’re up six with three-and-a-half minutes left and we had three straight turnovers and that’s not going to win basketball games.”

The game was close throughout as the teams battled to an 8-8 tie after one quarter and the Beavers came back from a four-point (17-13) second-quarter deficit to forge a one-point (23-22) lead after a free throw by Anderson before halftime.

Beaver Local took its largest lead of the night at eight points (38-30) following a trey by Cowdery with 1:56 left in the third quarter. But the Potters impressively answered with six points by Abercrombie to pull within two (38-36) of the hosts entering a wild fourth quarter.

East Liverpool took as much as a six point (46-44) lead following a fielder by Abercrombie with 4:09 left in the game.

But the Beavers forced three turnovers out of the Potters and took the lead at 49-48 on an Anderson layup with 1:04 left. After a Potter turnover, Anderson upped the Beavers’ lead to 50-48, converting the front end of a free throw with 23.2 seconds left.

“We went down six there and changed defenses and went to the traps and got some easy ones and got back in the game,” said Miller.

East Liverpool trimmed the deficit to one point (50-49) on a free throw with 7.2 seconds left, but Anderson countered with a charity toss, taking the lead back to two at 51-49 with 5.9 seconds left.

“It was a team effort, we always go out and swing the ball around to get the best look,” said Anderson. “It was a lot of pressure and we knew to conserve our energy to go the full four quarters.”

East Liverpool had a chance to tie the game at the free-throw line with just 0.5 seconds left, but both attempts failed and Beaver Local grabbed the rebound after the second miss to secure the win.

“I hope we see them (the Beavers) again,” said Reynolds. “There’s a chance we could see them in OVAC’s and in the sectional tournament because it’s always fun when we get together.”

“We finished it at the free throw line and on the defensive end like we have all year,” observed Miller.

Notes

¯ Beaver Local won the first meeting with the Potters, 68-48 at Potter Fieldhouse.

¯ East Liverpool will host Indian Creek Friday night.

¯ Beaver Local also returns to action Friday when the Beavers entertain the Brooke Bruins in Buckeye 8 action.

EL: 8-14-14-13–49

BL: 8-15-15-13–51

EAST LIVERPOOL SCORING: Jayce Douglas 1-2-4, Dre Brown 3-1-7, Tyler Kirby 2-1-5, Nolan Irving 1-0-2, Dre’Keim Abercrombie 9-5-23, Meshach Harris 0-0-0, Ben Myers 0-0-0, Elliott Fitch 1-0-2, Javan Dawson 2-1-6. TEAM TOTALS: 19, 10-16: 49

BEAVER LOCAL SCORING: Matt Anderson 6-8-20, Luke Rettos 2-0-4, Nick McKenzie 4-0-8, Aiden Dray 3-3-9, Tucker McElroy 2-0-4, J. Johnson 0-0-0, Peyton Cowdery 2-0-6. TEAM TOTALS: 19, 11-19: 51

Three-point goals: East Liverpool 1 (Javan Dawson 1). Beaver Local (Peyton Cowdery 2); Total fouls: East Liverpool 18, Beaver Local 15. Fouled out: none.

Girls game

CALCUTTA — East Liverpool shook off a first quarter where it scored just two points to come back to beat Beaver Local 39-28 on Wednesday in girls basketball action.

Beaver Local led 10-2 after the first quarter, but East Liverpool outscored the Beavers 27-9 in the second half to pull out the win.

LaNease Andrews sparked the Potters with 25 points, while Beaver Local was led by Mallory Miller’s seven points.

East Liverpool is 6-10 and broke a three game losing skid.

The Potters will play Barnesville at 2 p.m. on Saturday in a Buckeye 8 fifth-place game at the ECO Center in St. Clairsvillle.

Beaver Local (6-10) will place Bellaire at noon on Saturday in the seventh-place game.

EL: 2-10-15-12–39

BL: 10-9-6-3–28

EAST LIVERPOOL SCORING: Presley Jones 0-2-2, Ava Green 2-1-5, LaNease Andrews 6-9-25, Aubrey Lyle 0-0-0, Courtney Barker 1-1-3, Arie Weyand 0-0-0, Abrianna Copeland 0-0-0, Meadow O’Rourke 2-0-4. TEAM TOTALS: 11, 13-23: 39.

BEAVER LOCAL SCORING: Gianna Congrove 0-0-0, Mercedes McCullough 1-0-3, Jansen Ours 0-0-0, Bella McLevey 1-0-3, Mallory Miller 2-3-7, Mai Gaydos 1-0-2, Ally Wright 1-4-6, Mya Anderson 2-0-5, Brylee Curtis 1-0-2. TEAM TOTALS: 9, 7-23: 28.

Three-point goals: East Liverpool 2 (Andrews), Beaver Local 3 (McCullough, McLevey, Wright)