Coach Ken McDonald pulled out the clipboard during a timeout with only 15.4 seconds remaining in overtime. The entire team stood around the bench watching everything drawn by the black marker.
Deshaun Thomas, with a game-high 24 points, dribbled to the baseline and fired the ball to three-point marksman Demetri McCamey. The shot sunk, McCamey drew a foul, and the Austin Spurs completed a four-point play to lead 90-89. Just like they drew it up.
“Demetri came in and he came up big,” said Thomas about McCamey, who had a career-high 22 points. “He came in attack mode, hit big threes and made some good plays on the defensive end.”
That crucial play occurred in the first overtime of a wild 96-94 double-overtime Spurs victory over the Oklahoma City Blue.
The Blue tied the game seconds later to send it into a second overtime, but the Spurs managed to keep their composure.
The second extra frame was competitive, each team trading baskets until small forward Orlando Johnson hit a layup with 1.5 seconds to go. Johnson played two games with the Phoenix Suns before re-signing with Austin. He returned to the team when they needed it most.
“Orlando’s a shot-maker, a playmaker,” Cady Lalanne said. “Having Orlando there gives another opportunity to score the ball. We just put the ball in his hands at the end of the game, and he made a play happen.”
In a game that seemed to come down to shots in the final seconds, it wasn’t always close.
Oklahoma City stormed out to a 15-point lead in the first half, outshooting the Spurs 47.4 percent to 31.7 percent. The Spurs had no answer for their physical offense in the first half, allowing the Blue to outscore Austin 26-8 in the paint in the half.
But Austin answered in the fourth quarter. McCamey scored 12 points and Thomas finished with his fourth double-double of the season. Behind an enthusiastic crowd of nearly 5,000, the Spurs rallied in crunch time to their first win since the All-Star break.
“We showed composure,” Thomas said. “We stayed in, and we got the win. Everybody was on the sidelines telling us to keep fighting. We never gave up – that’s one thing about our team.”
