Crespi Weathers Notre Dame’s Late 3-Point Barrage, 62-59

Matt Carpenter held the ball high above his head, which, considering that he stands 6-foot-8, meant leather was nearly touching the slat wooden roof of the old Quonset hut that Notre Dame High calls a gym.

Carpenter, Crespi’s senior center, had just put the final nail in Notre Dame’s coffin by intercepting an inbounds pass with two seconds to play.

“I’ll give them credit,” Carpenter said with a nod toward the Notre Dame bench. “They don’t give up easy.”

But then, it wouldn’t be Crespi-Notre Dame if it wasn’t a nail-biter. Or as Carpenter put it: “It’s the best rivalry in the Valley.”

Crespi weathered a scorching three-point barrage by Notre Dame in the fourth quarter--not to mention 29 points--to escape with a 62-59 victory in a Mission League game before a packed house.

Crespi (10-7, 5-2 in league play) seemingly had the game won a half-dozen times in the second half. For instance, the Celts led, 41-30, entering the fourth quarter.

However, Notre Dame (8-11, 2-5) caught fire behind forward Glen Carson (13 points), who drilled three consecutive three-point baskets in the opening 55 seconds of the fourth quarter. Inexplicably, Carson was removed for several minutes midway through the quarter.

Rob Leff (14 points) kept the Celts on top by making three three-point baskets of his own in the quarter. Leff canned a pair of free throws with 1 minute 15 seconds remaining to extend Crespi’s lead to 59-50, and it appeared to be all but over. Damon Germanides (17 points) had other ideas.

Germanides tossed in a three-point bucket--he had four in the quarter--with 59 seconds left to cut the lead to 59-53. A free throw by Charles Aghajanian and two by Leff gave the Celts a 62-53 lead with 38 seconds left, and again the Knights seemed dead in the water.

Yet Germanides tossed in a three-point basket, and after Crespi turned the ball over on the inbounds play, he hit another with six seconds left, paring the Celts’ lead to three. Leff was fouled after taking the inbounds pass but missed the front end of the one-and-one with four seconds left. Carpenter, unable to snare the rebound, alertly tapped the ball out of bounds at the baseline.

With two seconds remaining, Carson tried to inbound the ball with a lob pass, but Carpenter intercepted to preserve the victory.