PORT ARTHUR, Texas - The Bossier Parish Community College Cavaliers held off the Lamar State College Port Arthur Seahawks 75-72 in an overtime thriller here Saturday afternoon. The win was the first of the season for the Cavaliers and the first for BPCC head coach J.A. Anglin.
Paul King, the Cavaliers' only returning player from last year, led all scorers with 23 points, and was one of four BPCC players to reach double figures. Fahmmi Mamo scored 16 points, while Avery Martinez added 13 and Christian Caldwell chipped in with 10.
Sophomore Ty Archibald, a 6-footer from The Woodlands, Texas, led the Seahawks with 20 points scored and teammates Kanntrell Burney and Joe Lucien added 17 and 14 points, respectively.
Lamar State led 36-33 at the half but the Cavaliers, also 1-1, rallied to tie the game 63-63 at the end of regulation. The two teams were knotted 70-70 with 1:50 left in the extra period.
Archibald's rebound of a missed BPCC 3-pointer followed but a 30-second shot clock violation left the score 70-all with 48.2 ticks remaining. The Seahawks' Adrian Caldwell II and Kobi Johnson pestered the Cavs' ball-handler, King, like crazy just across midcourt. At the last possible moment, King found Martinez, who hit a nifty catch-and-shoot 3-pointer from the corner with 16.2 seconds left.
After a 3-pointer miss by LSCPA and a desperation foul with 4.1 seconds left, 6-foot-8 Tutu Majok put the game away by hitting two free throws.
The Cavs led by eight points early, 20-12, seven minutes into the game. The Seahawks countered with an 11-2 run led by Lucien's slam dunk and the second of Burney's three 3-pointers to take the lead, 23-22, with 6:31 left in the first.
After BPCC's Caldwell hit a pair of free throws to put his team up 24-23, Kenyawn Bowie's strong move to the bucket touched off another 11-2 Seahawks run that put them up eight points, 34-26, with 4 minutes left in the half.
Archibald hit back-to-back 3-balls and point guard Johnson added a trey of his own to make it three-in-a-row.
BPCC wasted little time tying the game at 36-36 to start the second half, with King hitting a 3-pointer. But the Seahawks did not trail in the second half until after they built they built their biggest second-half lead, 58-53, on a baseline jumper by Archibald with 4:02 remaining.
After a timeout, the Cavs dropped in back-to-back 3-pointers by King and Martinez to grab the lead at 59-58. The Seahawks pulled even at 61- and 63-all on a pair of buckets by Burney, the 5-11 sophomore from Dallas who scored 26 points to spark LSCPA to a 94-54 win of its season opener at Jacksonville Thursday.
But on Saturday, neither team could score in the final 1:04, so the extra period was needed.
Majok, a sophomore from Cairo, Egypt, grabbed 14 rebounds to lead the taller Cavs to a 48-37 edge on the glass, while Lucien, a 6-7 freshman from Beaumont, pulled down 10 boards to notch the Seahawks' first double-double of the year.
Adrian Caldwell II, a 6-5 freshman from Katy, grabbed seven rebounds for LSCPA and scored eight points. Lucien scored six points in a game that saw the Seahawks go cold on their shooting in the second half.
With the win, BPCC improves to 1-1 on the young season. The Cavaliers play host to the Tyler Junior College Apaches on Wednesday, Jan. 27 in the Coach Billy Montgomery Gym. The Seahawks dropped to 1-1 for the season. They take the court again Wednesday night, Jan. 27, in a 7 p.m. game at Panola College in Carthage.