By Matt Tasler/sportsreporter@trcle.com

JOSHUA — They don’t call them free throws for nothing.

The Stephenville Yellowjackets sank 15-of-21 free throws on the way to edging Joshua 62-61 on Friday night in a District 8-4A contest.

Joshua held a 45-38 lead early in the fourth quarter, but Stephenville got back-to-back 3-pointers from Trey Taylor and Victor Martinez to pull within one at 45-44.

Joshua’s Austen Phillips answered with a jumper, but Nick Young tied it at 47 on a 3-pointer with 5:35 to play.

The Yellowjackets got five straight points from Taylor to take a 56-53 lead, but Jason Hatch found Jesse Williamson on a no look pass for a layup that cut the gap to 56-55 with less than a minute to play.

Stephenville knocked down four straight free throws surrounding a Joshua missed field goal, upping the lead to 60-55 with 11.98 seconds left.

“They hit them the whole game,” Joshua head coach Johnny White said of Stephenville’s free throw shooting. “I don’t know what they were in the game. I think they started the game off with a missed free throw and I don’t remember them missing many after that. It was that good. You’ve just got to roll the dice at that point.”

Toby Morris hit a bucket in the lane and the ensuing free throw to make it 60-58. The Owls had no choice but to foul Stephenville and Taylor hit two more that put the game out of reach. Joshua’s Sidney Pruitt hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer that made it 62-61.

“I expected a great game, I expected a tight game,” White said. “We’ve been watching these guys all year. We knew they were going to be tough and we were going to have to come in here and try to hold our home court. Now we’ve got to go down to Stephenville and that’s even tougher.”

Taylor finished with a game-high 27 points, while Williamson led the Owls with 19 and Pruitt added 16. Hatch and Wiley Jones each scored seven points for Joshua.

With the win, Stephenville (9-5, 3-0) remains unbeaten within the league, while Joshua (12-6, 1-2) dropped two games back.

“I thought we played a great game, especially in the third quarter,” White said. “We held them to five points in the third quarter and they got hot right there at the beginning of the fourth. They hit two straight 3’s and I called timeout. That was the difference in the game. At that point right there we had gotten a little lead and had a great defensive third quarter, 14-5, and we let it slip away from us right at the beginning of the fourth.”

Joshua held a 19-15 lead at the end of the first quarter, turning a 13-12 deficit into a 19-13 advantage thanks to 7-0 run. Stephenville hit a bucket in the lane to close out the scoring in the first quarter with the Owls leading by four.

The Yellowjackets tied the contest again at 25 with 5:20 to play in the second quarter and used an 8-4 run to take a 33-29 lead into the half.

Joshua opened the second half with buckets by Jones and Pruitt to knot the score at 33 and the Owls took a 36-35 lead on a 3-pointer from Pruitt with three minutes left in the third.

Stephenville answered with a 3-pointer, but Joshua closed the period with a 7-0 run — with five points coming from Pruitt and two from Toby Morris — to take the five point lead to the fourth period.

“One thing we can do is we can score from all five spots,” White said. “Those two guys [Pruitt and Williamson] can score a lot and we weren’t really as balanced tonight as we normally are. Normally our four spot gives us a few more points. We did a great job defensively though, but we were a little shy on the points area from the four and the three.”