On Monday, Feb. 5, the Loyalists, once again, defended their home court against the DSBN Academy on the road to the NRHSAA finals.

The first quarter was intense as both teams were relentless on the glass, but DSBN closed out the first quarter 12-10.

Too close for comfort, the Loyalists came out of a first-quarter huddle with determination to turn the score around. The go-getter Will K ran into difficulty early in the game as the referees found his level of intensity a little too much for the visiting team. But that did not stop him from supporting his team from the bench and the Loyalists rallied back within the last 4 minutes of the quarter to out-hustle and outscore DSBN giving the Loyalists a 20-17 lead at half-time.

After returning from the locker room on a high note, RLA struggled to stop DSBN’s penetration to the basket. In fact, the visitors outscored the Loyalists 15-9 in the third quarter.

The Loyalists continued to feed off the inspiration of their homecourt fans and took the fight to the visitors. The score remained gridlocked 38-38 until the final seconds of the game. Steven Tang, with his patience, acuity, and attention to detail instinctively knew how to read the defense and delivered the ball precisely into the hands of Bryant Ogoh with only 15 seconds left on the game clock. Ogoh jumped to shoot and was fouled, giving him the opportunity to clinch the game from the free-throw line with just 10 seconds remaining on the clock.

As Ogoh approached the line to attempt his first shot, the entire building was silent, but then erupted when he banked his first shot! He also landed his second, putting RLA up 40-38, which was the final score as the whistle blew a few seconds later.

Contributing scorers for RLA were Stephan-Obama Delva 2 points; Will Kulidjian 2 points; Tom Zunik 12 points; Nathaniel Cobrand 10 points; Steven Tang 2 points; Bryant Ogoh 12 points.