San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Styles’ buzzer-beater propels Greyhounds
Devin Styles thought he missed it.
But the Boerne junior’s last-second shot rolled around the rim, then dropped through the net as the clock struck zero.
“I saw the ball fall. It was surreal,” Styles said after the Greyhounds came up with a 61-59 victory over the Somerset Bulldogs on Friday at Taylor Field House.
The Region IV-4A final win came three days after the Boerne girls punched their ticket to the state semifinals. It is the Greyhound boys fourth trip to the state semifinal and first since 2008.
“It’s a shame somebody has to lose,” Boerne coach Kimble McHone said. “We knew they were going to make a run. We just had to withstand it.”
Boerne (27-3) led for most of the night and at one point in the third quarter pushed its advantage to 42-30 before Somerset (17-11) battled back with a 16-4 run that was capped by a three-point play from Christian Rodriguez.
In the celebration of tying the score at 46, the Bulldogs were called for a technical foul and the Greyhounds given a chance to take th elead. Somerset answered with a 4-0 run to go up 50-48 with four minutes remaining in regulation.
The final four minutes turned into a back-and-forth contest with both teams trading the lead. Somerset went up 53-50 when Jacob Alcorta knocked down a 3-pointer with two minutes left.
A minute later, Matthew Soto gave Somerset its largest lead of the night at 57-50, when he knocked down a pair of free throws with a minute left.
Boerne’s Joaquin Gonzalez cut the deficit to 57-54 with 52.8 seconds remaining. Twelve seconds later, after Somerset had gone up 58-54, Boerne got a 3-pointer from Gonzalez to cut the deficit to one.
Somerset’s Jaxon Gutierrez made one of two free throws with 23 seconds left to give Somerset a 59-57 lead before Gonzalez tied it with 10 seconds left to set up the Greyhounds with a chance for the buzzer-beater.
Boerne fell short of its state aspirations last season, losing in the regional final to Stafford. This time, the Greyhounds were hoping for a different result.
It took until the final seconds, but they got it. They are slated to face Huffman Hargrave in the state semifinals at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Delmar Fieldhouse in Houston.
“We weren’t going to let anything stop us from moving on from this round,” Styles said.
Somerset was looking to make its second trip to the state semifinals and first since 2018. Instead, the Bulldogs are left in the position Boerne found itself last season.
“Our goal from day one was to get to this point and let the chips fall where they may,” Somerset coach Bryan Penna said. “We will be back here. We’re going to get back here and make it to the next round.”