LUMBERTON — Through the Lumberton boys basketball game’s first two teams, as the opposition built leads against the Pirates, the young team struggled to even threaten a comeback.

The second half was different Monday, with Lumberton gradually closing in on Scotland from an 11-point deficit.

But the Pirates couldn’t make the necessary plays to complete the comeback, and took a 44-38 loss to drop to 0-3 on the young season.

“We just wanted to get it possession by possession, get three stops in a row if we could, and then try to execute, capitalize on stops,” Lumberton coach Bryant Edwards said. “We got a few stops, and we got a couple made buckets — just whenever we needed it to happen, we cut it to two twice, and we couldn’t even get a shot off, we turned the ball over twice.”

Scotland (2-1) led Lumberton 20-12 at halftime and took a 23-12 lead when Jaquez Caldwell hit a 3 in the opening moments of the third quarter. But the Pirates’ began to claw back with a 3 by Damian Robinson, and with two baskets from Jaiden Shephard got within four points twice during the third quarter, trailing 31-26 at the period’s end after Aiden Locklear beat the buzzer with a corner 3.

Robinson scored on a traditional 3-point play with 7:04 remaining to pull the Pirates within two at 31-29. Two baskets from Caldwell and another from Zion Morrison stretched Scotland’s advantage to 37-29 with 2:40 to play — but Robinson hit the next four baskets, including a triple, to pull the Pirates to a 41-38 deficit with 38 seconds left.

Lumberton forced a Scotland turnover when the Scots couldn’t get the ball in bounds in the allotted five seconds, but the Pirates missed three shots in the last 25 seconds while Scotland hit three free throws in the moments between to seal the win.

“That’s the first time we’ve been in that situation; Fairmont was up 10 and 12 late in the game,” Edwards said. “For us to be in that situation, it’s the first time a lot of these guys have been in that situation, so for us to work on it — it didn’t really shock me that we weren’t able to execute down the stretch, because this is a brand new team, so young, but it’s good for us to experience that.”

The game’s final few possessions weren’t the only time Lumberton saw offensive lapses; the Pirates struggled offensively throughout the first half, scoring six points in each of the first two quarters.

Each team hit one field goal through the first 4 1/2 minutes of the game, with Scotland using free throws to take a 6-2 lead during the span. Lumberton cut the lead to 8-6 before the Scots used a Caldwell layup and a Ji’Sea McPhatter free throw to take an 11-6 lead at the end of the quarter.

The Scots extended the lead to 15-6 in the first minute of the second quarter, but Lumberton fought back with baskets from Robinson and Nick Lawson to narow the gap to 15-10 with 3:34 left in the half. But the Pirates were held to just two free throws over the rest of the half, and Scotland led 20-12 at intermission.

“If we hold a team under 50 points, we’ve got to win that game,” Edwards said. “We’ve just got to score the ball. We were 3-for-24 again from the 3-point line again tonight. Our team can actually shoot the basketball; it’s not showing right now, but maybe the youngness will start to wear off soon and we can put some points on the board, but until then it’s going to be pretty ugly.”

Shephard led Lumberton with 12 points, Robinson had 11 and Locklear had five.

Caldwell scored 17 to lead the Scots, with 11 points from Dylan Lampley and five from Jonathan Graham.

Lumberton doesn’t play again until facing the Scots again next Monday in Laurinburg.

“We’ve got a week, we don’t play again until next Monday night,” Edwards said. “We’ve only got two games left before the Shootout, and our goal is definitely not to be 0-5 going into that, so we definitely want to get those next two.”

Lady Pirates’ offensive woes continue

Offensive struggles that have plagued the Lumberton girls basketball team in the opening weeks of the 2023-24 season continued Monday night as visiting Scotland earned a 48-26 nonconference win over the Pirates.

“We’ve got to knock down shots,” Lumberton coach Ivy Johnson said. “We’re not shooting well from the field, I think we’re shooting less than 30%. Anytime you’re struggling when you get a chance to knock it down, it makes it more difficult when you make it harder on yourself when you don’t knock down open shots and you’re missing layups.”

Lumberton (0-3) scored three field goals or less in each quarter.

Scotland (3-0) held the Pirates to one field goal over the first seven minutes of the game, taking a 12-3 lead behind five early points from Madison Dixon and four more from Nyasia McQueen. The Scots led 13-6 after one quarter, with Florence Ferguson nailing a late 3 for the Pirates.

Lumberton’s defense played strong enough to keep the Pirates in the game for a while, holding Scotland to one field goal over the first four minutes of the half; the Pirates trailed 15-8 after a baseline jumper by Charley Whitley with 4:12 on the clock. But Lumberton didn’t score the rest of the period, while Scotland ended the half on a 10-0 run behind triples from Madysan Hammonds and Alicia McClain to take a 25-8 lead at the break.

Scotland extended its lead to 25 points in the third quarter and led 39-16 at the end of the stanza.

“I think that we have spurts where everybody does something good,” Johnson said. “It’s not like we have a game where everybody does something awful, but we’ve got to do more of (the good things) more often and put it together. … I think the only way to do that is to push through; we’ve got to be resilient right now.”

Andrea Brown led Lumberton with eight points, Whitley had six and Gabby Locklear netted five.

McClain led all scorers with 13 points, with Morgan Thompson scoring 10 points and Dixon and Hammonds each adding nine for the Scots.