ST. PAULS — Theophilus Setzer and Tykeem Oxendine may be best known in St. Pauls and beyond for their play on the football field. But Friday night in an intense environment at Raymond M. Ammons Gymnasium, both proved their capabilities on the basketball court too.

Both Bulldog guards made multiple pivotal plays down the stretch and in the extra session, upending a game that was led most of the night by Red Springs to earn a 68-65 overtime win in a rivalry thriller.

“Down the stretch, I think our guys really — this is the first time all year that we battled and stuck with it, despite the missed free throws, despite the turnovers, despite the missed assignments,” St. Pauls coach Corey Thompson said. “I thought that we battled and locked in when we lost Tyson (Thompson); the guys really rallied together, and I saw the brotherhood tonight, and as a coach, I’m happy. … That’s what we’ve wanted the whole year is to be a team, and I thought the tonight was the night we came together as a team.”

Oxendine hit a 3-pointer with 30 seconds left in overtime to give St. Pauls (9-11, 2-4 Southeastern Athletic Conference) a 66-63 lead, doing so after he had previously scored the Bulldogs’ first basket of the extra session and had tied the game making one of two free throws with 54 seconds to go.

“Tykeem has been coming along really good for us throughout the season,” Corey Thompson said. “The kid works hard really well in practice, he has really good practice, so it’s no surprise to us what we see on the court. He does it every day in practice, so I’m glad he got the chance to step up tonight and make some big shots for us.”

Setzer then knocked down two free throws with 13 seconds on the clock to extend the Bulldogs’ lead to 68-63; Red Springs’ Makhi Arthur hit a layup with five seconds to go to get the score back to its final three-point margin.

The game was in overtime because of a play made by Setzer at the end of regulation. With St. Pauls trailing 59-57, Setzer made a putback of a teammate’s miss as he was fouled with 2.2 seconds left. He missed the ensuing free-throw attempt, but the play nonetheless served to keep the Bulldogs alive.

“Theo from the start was — and that kid was hurting, he was in halftime nursing his back and stuff — but talk about a leader,” Corey Thompson said. “It wasn’t lip service, it was action tonight. Hats off to him, and he battled the whole time, and if it wouldn’t have been for him and other guys the outcome probably could’ve gone a different way. Theo’s leadership shows on the football field, and it just carried over on the basketball court, so I’m just excited for him moving forward.”

A lack of execution by Red Springs (8-12, 3-3 Southeastern), both down the stretch of regulation and in overtime, hurt Red Devils’ chances at a second-straight win over their rivals. The team committed two turnovers in the final minute over overtime, ultimately missing a potential game-tying 3-point try before Setzer’s two free throws put the Bulldogs up by five; lack of time-and-score awareness was also costly down the stretch.

“It was like we say one thing in the huddle and then we walk out and totally (different),” Red Springs coach Glenn Patterson Jr. said. “We had a hard time understanding the game plan. We were literally saying, when we got up by two, get back, let’s play defense, contain, keep them in front, allow no open looks at the rim — but we would foul. We fouled as soon as we scored two times in a row. It was just lack of execution, lack of being able to play in heated moments and understand and maintain the game plan. And we failed at that the entire fourth quarter and overtime and never could get on the right track; we kept having mental lapses after mental lapses.”

Red Springs led 53-47 with 5:09 left in regulation after a two straight baskets by Arthur. Triples by Jamir McMillan and Oxendine pulled St. Pauls within a 55-53 gap with 3:33 to go, then a layup by Oxendine with 2:08 left gave the Bulldogs a 56-55 lead. Arthur hit a layup for a 57-56 Red Devils lead and Kaedon Porter hit two free throws with 35 seconds remaining, but the combination of the plays made by St. Pauls and the mistakes by Red Springs led the game into overtime and an eventual Bulldogs win.

“St. Pauls gave us opportunities to win the game, by missed free throws, and we couldn’t capitalize,” Patterson Jr. said. “We’re up by two, and our guys were just going straight to the rim as if we were the ones down by two. We’re yelling stop it, slow it down, but everybody just sees the rim, and it costs us. That’s what happens when you get in an environment like this, a rivalry, the crowd is going wild, it’s a noisy gym, so much commotion going on, and they’re kids so their attention spans aren’t what they need to be.”

Tyson Thompson scored 18 points for St. Pauls, Setzer had 17, Oxendine netted 13 and Markeon Fletcher added 10.

Porter led Red Springs with 24 points, Arthur had 23 and Darren Wilkins scored 10.

Red Springs led 17-15 after one quarter and 20-19 after a back-and-forth first 10 minutes; the Red Devils finished the half on a 19-7 run to take a 39-26 lead at halftime.

“We stuck to the game plan (in the first half), we shared the ball, we were disciplined, we selected where we wanted our shots at,” Patterson Jr. said. “Second half, we blew a lead and they began to be more of let’s just go try to score the ball and put something up at the rim, instead of making the extra pass, sharing the ball, looking for the open man, or shooting the ball over two people instead of looking for the open man.”

St. Pauls came out of halftime with a 14-3 run, with seven points from Tyson Thompson and five by Fletcher, to pull to a 42-40 deficit with 2:25 left in the third. Red Springs led 47-44 at the end of the third and a basket and free throw a possession later by Tyson Thompson tied the score at 47-47 before a 6-0 spurt gave Red Springs its 53-47 lead, setting the stage for the stretch run.

“Too many times this year, we don’t make teams uncomfortable,” Corey Thompson said. “So we wanted to make Red Springs uncomfortable and do something different, as our assistant coach (Bill) Dockery said. Our game plan was to come out in the second half was just to make them uncomfortable, so I thought we did a pretty good job of that, and then also we were able to put the ball in the hole so that helped out as well.”

The teams split their two conference games after Red Springs’ 54-38 win on Jan. 17; St. Pauls has won two of three matchups overall, including a last-second 48-46 win in the third-place game of the Robeson County Shootout on Dec. 23.

Corey Thompson hopes the Bulldogs will use the momentum gained from Friday’s win to play better in the second turn through conference play, which began with Friday’s game.

“I know the guys were ready to play tonight, and hopefully this will be a game that will springboard us for the remainder of the season,” the coach said. “What I saw tonight, the togetherness, the fight, that’s what it’s going to take for us these last four games we have the remainder of conference.”

St. Pauls hosts Fairmont on Tuesday; Red Springs will host Clinton in its home finale.

Lady Bulldogs top Red Devils

With Tuesday’s game against conference-leading Fairmont looming, St. Pauls girls basketball coach Jaymar Thompson wanted to make sure his team didn’t get caught looking ahead as the Bulldogs met Red Springs Friday.

St. Pauls held the Red Devils to eight first-half points en route to a 55-38 win, the Bulldogs’ 16th consecutive victory in the series.

“We needed this conference win to make the game Tuesday more important — we can’t have no mental lapse,” Jaymar Thompson said. “We’re trying to make sure we take care of business and stay in the hunt. The goal is still the same, to at least try to share the title again, so tonight was an important game.”

St. Pauls (12-4, 5-1 Southeastern) held a 12-2 lead after the first quarter and took a 25-8 halftime lead. Both teams scored 30 points in the second half.

Jashontae Harris scored 25 points to lead the Bulldogs, with three rebounds and six steals, taking an even bigger role than her already large one with Zhariana Shipman limited for parts of the game by injury.

“She’s got to do what she’s got to do to win,” Jaymar Thompson said. “We were in this situation last year when Jakieya (Thompson) went down, and (Harris) has just got to do what she’s got to do. We’ve got to get creative getting her open, and making sure she has the ball in her hand, and she’s creating plays for everybody else and making sure everybody finishes now. You’ve got to beat Jashontae.”

Shipman scored 10 points with four steals, Ava Monroe had 10 points, five rebounds and four steals for the Bulldogs. Zakoreya Davis grabbed eight rebounds.

Nakira Hunt scored 10 points to lead Red Springs (4-14, 2-4 Southeastern), Monica Washington had nine points, Adriana Locklear netted seven points and Cabanna Wilkins scored five.