CATLIN — When it comes to crunch time, Oakwood senior Zack Girton craves the extra pressure. Though any of the five starters are capable of making big plays, the senior guard looks forward to coming off the bench and giving his team an extra spark.

So when he missed a crucial free throw with three seconds remaining in regulation that could have sealed a road win against the Salt Fork Storm, Girton felt so low he might have wanted to go hide.

And his psyche could have dropped even lower when he watched Salt Fork senior David Sacre drain a half-court shot at the buzzer to send the game into overtime. Instead, Girton stepped up and scored six of his team’s 14 points in the extra period to give the Comets a 65-57 overtime win.

“That was on me,” Girton said of the game being extended. “I missed that free throw. I was pretty mad. I felt like I let the team down by missing those free throws. I’m normally a pretty good at the free throw line. I have been hitting. I’ve missed two in like the last four games. I missed that third one.

“I kind of pride myself on being clutch, hitting clutch shots. I missed that first free throw and he made (a great shot). He called it as it was going in. He let it go and said, ‘That’s in.’ I just stopped.”

Girton might have stopped, but fortunately for the Comets, he didn’t give up. He hit a basket in overtime to give his team a 56-55 lead, and following the missed free throw in regulation, Girton — who finished the game with 13 points — made his next five attempts at the line.

Tyler Knight (eight points, three assists) hit a three at the beginning of overtime to tie the game at 54-54, and made five of his six free-throw attempts in the fourth quarter to help prevent the Storm from taking over in regulation.

Oakwood held a 16-point lead with four minutes, 49 seconds remaining in the third quarter before Salt Fork went on a 19-5 run that stretched into the fourth quarter and reduced its deficit to 42-40. The Storm tied the game at 44-44 with 1:12 to go, but Girton responded with his second three of the game to help the Comets regain the lead with 44 seconds remaining.

“Jake (England) hit me on that shot at the end of the fourth quarter,” Girton said. “I wasn’t even expecting it. I thought he was going to shoot and I started to crash. I realized he was passing it over to me, I caught it and shot it. I give the credit to Jake. It was a hell of a play.”

Girton’s performance didn’t surprise coach Doug Robinson. As the only bench player to see game time in Friday’s contest, Robinson had full confidence in the senior.

“It’s always great to have that one guy that gives you that spark off the bench,” Robinson said. “Zack is that guy. He has done well this whole entire season coming off the bench, doing his role, playing hard. Tonight, he kind of shined, so I’m proud of him.”

His play was key as Oakwood searched for other options when Salt Fork took the post out of the game following the first quarter. Cameron Lee scored 10 of his 15 points in the first, but then fell relatively silent after.

“We just tried to put pressure on their guards so they couldn’t even get the ball to him,” Sacre said. “It’s hard to make a pass into the post with a bunch of ball pressure.

“Coach just kind of got on us and we came together as a team and decided that we weren’t going to lose that game. We had to make a comeback, and we started there.”

Salt Fork sophomore Ross Learnard scored 10 of his team-high 15 points in the fourth quarter and overtime. He also added three assists and three steals. Cole Taylor (12 points), Sacre (11 points, three steals), and Alec Dutton (10 points) also reached double-figures. Max Stutsman finished with a team-high eight rebounds in addition to his seven points.

“I think it was one of those games where we got to a place where we had nothing to lose, and that can be a dangerous team to play against when they are playing with nothing to lose,” Salt Fork coach Aaron Hird said of the Storm’s comeback effort. “We turned into that. And we’ve been on the other side of that, too, when we get a big lead and people just came after us. If you give up some cheap ones, you say, ‘What chance did we have anyway?’ That’s kind of how it did turn around.”

For the Comets, perhaps it was fitting that the game went down to the wire. They lost to the Storm in overtime in the previous meeting, and in nearly all of its wins this season, Oakwood has either played close with the lead, or has been forced to come back from a deficit.

At this point in the season, the Comets welcome the added pressure as it will only help them in the upcoming regional.

“We’ve been talking about this since the regional seeds came out,” Robinson said. “We said we are going to build momentum for the regionals with each game from here on out. So this is a big help for us. I can’t be more proud of them than I am right now.”

Oakwood has now won four games in a row and will host Chrisman on Tuesday.

The win snapped a five-game winning streak for the Storm, and Hird hopes his squad takes the good and learns from the bad in an effort to bounce back on Tuesday in another tough contest at Georgetown-Ridge Farm.