Bobby Dawson saw the fight in his Lenoir Community College men’s basketball team that has been missing. But when the final horn sounded, the end result was the same.
The Lancers had suffered their sixth straight loss.
Mike Smith torched LCC for 29 points, 27 in the second half, to lead Rockingham C.C. to a 78-70 victory in overtime on Saturday.
The Lancers (4-8, 1-7 Region X Division II) didn’t trail until Bobby Scriven’s layup in transition put the Cougars up 37-36 with 13:32 left in the second half.
From there it was a nip-and-tuck battle with Rockingham taking advantage of some poor LCC shooting in the second half, especially in overtime.
“The guys are fighting and I haven’t seen that. They don’t give up,” said Dawson, whose team scored just 26 points in the first half and committed 28 total turnovers.
“Towards the end there we just made some mental mistakes and threw it away a couple times. In order for us to win we’ve got to cut down on our turnovers.”
Following Scriven’s lead-changing layup the lead exchanged hands four more times and it was tied four times as the teams battled their way to an extra five minutes.
LCC struggled from the field in the second half, shooting just under 42 percent, with most misses coming within the paint.
In overtime it was much worse.
The Lancers hit their first shot when Sharod Hines connected from about 8 feet but missed their final eight attempts.
The Cougars, meanwhile, hit 3 of their 6 field goal attempts to finish the final 25 minutes at an even 50 percent (19 for 38).
“It’s been that way all year. This is a good, young group, but (there’s) not a lot of experience out there,” Dawson said.
Inside of a minute left in regulation the Lancers looked poised to end a losing streak that dates back to the beginning of January.
Former Bethel Christian Academy standout Isaac Brown hit the first of two free throws to put LCC up 65-62 with 57.8 seconds left. But Rockingham scored the next six points — four in less than 4 seconds by Smith — to go up 68-65 with 6.7 seconds to play.
Blake Washington drained a 3 with .7 seconds left to send it to overtime, but the Lancers couldn’t get it done in the extra time.
Josh Hill finished with 23 points and 10 rebounds and Brown added 14 points and 14 rebounds for LCC, which fell to Catawba Valley C.C. 75-71 on Friday night.
Jalil Peterson (12 points) and Montrell Rogers (11 points) also reached double figures for the Lancers.
“We’ll sneak up on somebody one day, but I hope it’s soon,” Dawson said. “We’ve just got to play hard.”
LCC WOMEN 68, WAKE TECH 66
Zeara McDuffie’s buzzer-beater lifted the Lancers women to a Region X win in the first game of a doubleheader on Saturday.
Tameka Lewis scored a team-best 15 points, Sekethia Williams added 13 and Cana Marriott scored 12 for LCC, which improved to 12-5 overall, 3-2 in Region X play.
McDuffie scored nine points.
Ryan Herman can be reached at 252-559-1073 or Ryan.Herman@Kinston.com. Follow him on Twitter: @KFPSports.