On a night where School of the Osage didn't make many shots, the Lady Indians came up with a way to sink the biggest one of the game.
Osage, which made just three of its first 26 shots from the field (12 percent), hit its last attempt of the night to escape with a 50-48 win Monday against the Blair Oaks Lady Falcons.
When Kendal Miller banked in that shot - a 3-pointer from the right wing with :09 left - it gave the Lady Indians their only lead of the night at just the right time.
"Miller hit a 3-pointer last year at Cuba at the buzzer to win a game, so she can do that," Osage coach Scott Rowland said. "Now, to have a bank, I cannot imagine what coach (Kevin) Kohler and the Blair Oaks girls are thinking right now.
"But I'm proud that we executed. It didn't look the prettiest, but it when it went in."
The Lady Indians, who trailed by as many as 15 points in the second half, got a great look on the winning shot despite basically freelancing.
"We don't have a last-second type of play," Rowland said. "But what we talked about was, "Drive the ball as deep as you can and Miller spot up. If you can get to the rim, get to the rim. If you can't, kick it out and we'll take our chances.'"
Kohler said the Lady Falcons, who made just 1-of-7 free throws in the fourth quarter while trying to hold on for the win, found the loss hard to stomach.
"The only lead (Osage) had was the one that counted," he said. "That was a tough one. The girls are upset. But if they were in (the locker room) laughing, I wouldn't be very happy with them.
"Where they're at right now is: Are they going to grow from it or are they going to let it gnaw at them? The kind of character they have, I think they'll grow from it and step up and be ready to go."
The game, which featured 46 total fouls and 65 attempted free throws, was a single-digit contest for most of the night.
After the first quarter, Blair Oaks held a 14-7 lead in large part due to making 7-of-11 free throws.
The Lady Falcons took their biggest lead of the first half at 31-16 with 1:07 left before halftime following back-to-back 3s by Makenna Kliethermes and Kellie Fredendall.
Osage, which made just 2-of-14 shots in the opening quarter, hit just 1-of-8 in the second and trailed 31-18 at halftime. The Lady Indians got 12 of their first-half points thanks to free throws, keeping it closer than it could have been.
"We played horribly in that half, and Blair Oaks made us play horribly, but if we don't make those free throws, we're in trouble," Rowland said. "Great comebacks can happen, but if you're down 31-9, you don't come back from that. That's too much."
The Lady Indians then came out and missed their first four shots of the third quarter to run their total to 3-of-26. But they hit their next three - layups by Kerrigan Gamm and Briana Jordan and a 3-pointer by Miller - to jump-start the comeback.
Rowland was amazed when told the stat line for Osage's start.
"We haven't ever had that bad of a shooting night," he said.
"I kind of wish you hadn't told me about that - 3-of-26 is kind of amazing," he added with a smile.
Osage eventually outscored Blair Oaks 18-7 in the period to get within 38-36 heading to the final quarter.
"In the third quarter, we just kind of went flat for a few minutes," Kohler said. "With a good team like Osage, you just can't do that."
The Lady Indians got the game's first tie when they knotted it at 38 less than a minute into the final quarter, then tied it at 43 with 3:41 left.
The Lady Falcons missed the front end of two one-and-one situations in the final 27 seconds, only to get a huge offensive rebound both times. The second one led to a two-shot bonus, but Blair Oaks missed both to set up Miller's game-winner.
"One of the things we talked about at halftime was, against Blair Oaks at our place last year, we had a pretty good-sized lead and they outscored us 20-5 in the third quarter and won a great game," Rowland said. "(Assistant) coach (Brian) Lewis said, "We can do it back to them.'"
Osage improved to 13-2 with the win, while Blair Oaks fell to 8-8.
"We can't be the team that pouts about this," Kohler said. "In the last eight games before tonight, we were 6-2 and had started playing a lot better. And we played well tonight.
"We don't have time to worry about it, we've got Southern Boone (on Thursday at Ashland) and they're just as tough or tougher."
Sydney Wilde pumped in a game-high 17 points to lead Blair Oaks, while Fredendall chipped in with 10. Cassidy Prenger tied for the game high with 10 rebounds.
Gamm had a double-double to pace Osage, racking up 13 points and 10 rebounds. Gabrielle Hill scored a team-high 15 points.
In Monday's JV game, Blair Oaks won 53-29. Kliethermes had 16 points to pace the Lady Falcons, who moved to 8-3 on the season.
In the two-quarter freshman game, Blair Oaks captured a 24-7 win to improve to 5-0.