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After being bombarded early by six three-pointers by Ubly in Friday night's GTC East boys hoops opener, the Devils fought back and then pulled out a narrow, 62-61, thriller over the Bearcats on Jon Muxlow's lay-in with four seconds remaining.

"We've had some great games with Ubly the last few years. It always seems to come down to the last seconds," remarked Tony Burton, BC coach. "This was an important win for us, but it was more important because it was a home game."

Brown City, 1-0 in the East and 4-1 overall, first had to overcome a red-hot Bearcat team that sank six triples in the first five minutes to build a 22-7 lead.

Burton and assistant coach Jim Seidell gave out some words of wisdom , and crossed their fingers.

"We didn't think that they could shoot like that the whole game, but they've got the guys that can light it up. And, I thought we defended pretty well, but they still knocked them down," explained Burton. "Jim kept telling the kids to keep playing hard - they won't shoot that way the whole game. It's a 32-minute game and we just wanted to weather the storm."

After closing the deficit to 11, 26-15, by the end of the quarter, junior guard Jack McPhail ignited the BC offense with eight straight points, including two triples, to make it 26-23. McPhail's lay-up later gave Brown City its first lead, 33-32, late in the half. Ubly (0-1, 1-3) scored before the break to lead by one.

Triples by McPhail and A.J. Burton gave the Devils' their biggest lead of the game, 42-38, halfway through the third quarter. Again, though, the Bearcats went on a 10-4 run to close the quarter and lead by two, 48-46.

BC trailed by as many as six points, 59-53, in the fourth quarter. However, Burton canned five straight points to shave it to a one point game. A short jumper by outstanding forward Donovan Ogboh put BC on top 60-59 with 2:08 left. Ubly countered with a bucket to regain the lead by one.

Then, after the Bearcats missed a pair of free throws, Brown City looked to set up a game-winning shot. The ball finally went down inside to Burton with time winding down. He flicked a pass into the paint that was deflected by an Ubly defender. That's when Muxlow, a 6'3" junior grabbed the ball and put it in for the win.

"We were actually wanting to take a shot earlier (in the last possession)," explained Coach Burton. "A.J. drove the baseline and tried to kick it out. It ended up in Jon's hands."

McPhail finished with 23 points, including 14 in about a nine-minute span in the first half.

Burton commented, "Shooting, first of all, is a streaky thing and Jack just got on a roll there."

Meanwhile, Ogboh led all scorers with 25 points and also had a team-high 10 rebounds. Burton and Muxlow finished with and eight and six points.

More praise from Burton was directed to point guard Ed Rayba and a pair of reserves. "Ed Rayba had 10 assists. That was Ed's best game, so far. And, I thought Troy Mizer and Ryan Groat came off the bench and helped us. They just kind of settled us down and had some defensive stops."

Junior forward Jordan Kaufman led Ubly with 16 points.