CHERRY VALLEY—Players sometimes talk of being in "the zone" when they feel like any shot they put up is going to go in the basket. But if the players in Tuesday night's Cherry Valley-Springfield-Laurens boys basketball game were in any kind of shooting zone, it was the Twilight Zone.

At least until the final couple of minutes, when what had been a defensive, ugly game got exciting. CV-S senior Devin Waldman scored 12 of his game-high 15 points in the final quarter, including the game winning lay-up after going the length of the court with six seconds remaining to give the Patriots a 38-36 victory.

The win improves CV-S to 4-1 overall and 2-0 in Tri-Valley league play. With a win Friday at home over Edmeston, CV-S will have defeated all the teams in the Tri-Valley Large.

On Tuesday, CV-S nearly equaled their output of the first three quarters in the fourth quarter alone, outscoring the Leopards 17-8 after scoring just 21 points before then.

"The shooting was horrific," said CV-S boys basketball coach Dave Armstrong. "On the bright side I thought we played very good defense, but we just could not put the ball in the basket."

Trailing 33-29 with just over two minutes remaining, Waldman was fouled while shooting a three-pointer, and converted all three free throws to cut the lead to 33-32.

After Laurens' Marcus Bailey hit one of two free throws, Waldman hit a fade away baseline jumper to tie the score at 34-34 with 50 seconds remaining.

After Bailey hit a hook shot in the lane to give Laurens a 36-34 lead, Waldman again tied the score on a drive to the basket. Laurens set up for the final shot, but Bailey was called for a travel, setting up Waldman's heroics.

It was the second straight game Waldman hit the game-winning shot for the Patriots, as last Tuesday he hit the game-winner in a 58-56 overtime victory over Mohawk.

In a loss to Laurens last year, Waldman was in a similar position at the end of the game and passed off to a teammate who had the pass go through his hands.

"I just told him to take the ball to the basket and not pass it off," Armstrong said of the winning shot. "Devin's an intelligent player and he likes that pressure at the end of the game. We're going to need someone else to step up and score some points to take some pressure off him."

Both Laurens and CV-S played the game without a starter, as the Patriots' Chris Lusk is recovering from a knee injury, and Laurens' Jesse Jacobsen broke his hand recently.

Josh Sokolowski led Laurens with 10 points, eight of those coming in the first half.

...Armstrong praised senior forward Kevin Mabie's defensive work on Laurens' Ryan Keator, who entered the game averaging better than 20 points-a-game, but had just six Tuesday...CV-S's Ben Mead hit a three-point shot early in the fourth quarter which broke a scoring drought which has lasted close to six minutes.

Kerr hit two three-points shots as Milford improved to 3-2 overall and 1-1 in Tri-Valley play.

Chad Richards had six points and 12 rebounds for the Wildcats, while Kenny Mann added five points.

Morris's Chris Ruke scored half of his team's points and added 11 rebounds.