The only words that could be used to describe the ending to Lehigh Senior High School’s most promising basketball season ever –\u00a0shocking!<\/strong><\/p>\n Simply stated –\u00a0shocking!<\/strong><\/p>\n More than 200 students, parents,\u00a0teachers, cheerleaders, and fans traveled north to Jefferson High School in Tampa to witness what was so many thought would be the last step to the final four – a trip to Lakeland – a state championship.<\/p>\n Hours earlier, in the parking lot\u00a0were buses were loading\u00a0students, faculty and fans\u00a0who were making the three-hour trip north, the new Lehigh Lightning football coach (who was attending the game)\u00a0James Chaney was asked what his early season\u00a0focus and\u00a0messages have been to his new team. Without hesitation\u00a0he said “Finish – Finish your\u00a0classes, Finish school. And finish on the field”. How prophetic these words would become\u00a0just four\u00a0and a\u00a0half hours later …JUST FINISH!<\/strong><\/p>\n The Jefferson Dragons Den was ringing\u00a0with the most famous basketball song of all-time –\u00a0Nah Nah Nah Nah,\u00a0\u00a0Nah Nah Nah Nah, Hey Hey,\u00a0Good\u00a0Buy. The over 200 zany, hysterical, Lehigh\u00a0crazies were raising the rafters\u00a0as the clock showed a mere 38 seconds remaining in the game\u00a0and Lehigh had what was seemingly\u00a0an insurmountable 6 point lead and\u00a0they have the ball!\u00a0What started out\u00a0so promising, winning the tip off, and burying the first shot of the game, a three-pointer\u00a0no less, then followed by a patent slam dunk the evening was off\u00a0to a glorious\u00a0start. Lehigh\u00a0held the lead\u00a0every single minute of the first half going into the locker room 32-29 after leading\u00a0by as\u00a0many as 7 points.<\/p>\n After two back-to-back turnovers\u00a0by Lehigh\u00a0to start the second half, Jefferson had cut the lead to 2. And with\u00a06:31\u00a0remaining in the third period they took the lead 33 – 32 for the first time.\u00a0It would only last less than 15 seconds as the Lightning took control again and soon moved the lead back up to 6 before letting the pesky Dragons back into at the end of the third 52 – 51.<\/p>\n The game sea sawed back and forth in the final period, but Lehigh never gave up the lead until ……\u00a0\u00a0leading by 6 with 38 ticks left on the clock and with Lehigh holding the ball, things did not look good for the hometown Dragons.\u00a0Then\u00a0it\u00a0started. Turnover\u00a0# 1. Resulting in a desperate\u00a0three ball shot thrown up from the corner banking off the glass cutting the lead to 3. But Lehigh still has the ball. A quick time out\u00a0by Jefferson set the stage.<\/p>\n They say the definition of insanity is doing the same things again and again,\u00a0and expecting different results. When Lehigh lined up for the inbounds pass\u00a0in the same set that they had moments earlier,\u00a0and then ran the\u00a0same inbounds play,\u00a0well\u00a0the result was exactly the same –\u00a0turnover\u00a0# 2. A resulting basket cut the Lightning lead to 1, 72 – 71. And there was still 7.8 seconds left\u00a0but\u00a0Lehigh will\u00a0get one more chance to put this game away after\u00a0a Dragons\u00a0time out.<\/p>\n Certainly, this inbounds pass will find its way past half court. But, insanity reigns.\u00a0Turnover # 3 and after\u00a0Jefferson’s last\u00a0time out, there are\u00a04.1 seconds left to Lakeland! However this time it’s Jefferson that has the ball. Cinderella, does this Regional Crown fit?<\/p>\n That answer came with an inbounds pass, a couple of dribbles, a bounce pass to an open Dragon for an uncontested layup and Lehigh (26 – 2)\u00a0found itself on the short\u00a0end of a\u00a073-72 final score.\u00a0A shocking ending to as an exciting high school basketball game as you will ever find. One couldn’t write\u00a0a script more compelling.<\/p>\n It was simply, well\u00a0SHOCKING!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Exclusive to the\u00a0Lehigh Acers Gazette By Dick Allan \u00a0(Click here to see other photos) The only words that could describe the ending to the Region 6A-3 Florida state boys\u2019 basketball… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35096"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35096\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/IMGP1266-300x198.jpg\" "\\"IMGP1266\\"")
The only words that could describe the ending to the Region 6A-3 Florida state boys\u2019 basketball tournament –\u00a0shocking!<\/strong><\/p>\n