AUBURN – With the clock ticking down and trailing by three in Saturday night’s clash of KVAC South powers, Edward Little got the ball into the hands of the man it wanted.

Corey Therriault got off a clean shot from behind the arc, and it even tickled some twine when it came down. Unfortunately for the Red Eddies, it didn’t go through the metal cylinder first, and they had to walk off their own court losers for the first time in three years, 57-54.

With the length to match EL inside and the leadership of Alonzo James and Alex Kee, Morse handed the Eddies their first home loss since they fell to Gardiner during Troy Barnies’ junior year.

EL whittled away at an nine-point deficit in the fourth quarter, pulling to within two early in the period and then one when Tyler Gammon drilled a 3-pointer then put back a Therriault miss to make it 55-54 with 12 seconds left.

The Eddies fouled Kee with 4.2 seconds to go and he sank both freebies sandwiched around an EL timeout. Yusuf Iman inbounded after the second make to Dominique Bailey, who dribbled to halfcourt before finding Therriault on the right side of the arc. Therriault got off a turnaround just before the buzzer sounded, but came up short.

Therriault finished with a game-high 22 points, including four 3-pointers. Bailey chipped in with 10 points and eight rebounds off the bench for the Eddies (6-2). Kee paced Morse with 17 points, despite finding foul trouble in the first half. James added 13 and Ryan Chaney 11 points, 13 rebounds and three blocks for the Shipbuilders (7-1).

EL rode Therriault’s hot hand early (three 3-pointers in the first quarter), but could never establish an inside game with Sean Daigle, James Philbrook and Shane Ciriello, who combined for just 14 points, battling the 6-foot-5 Chaney and 6-foot-4 Nate Elwell on the blocks.

“I put our best defender (James) on Therriault, knowing he was going to score, and then we just tried to lock everybody else down as best we could,” Morse coach Todd Flaherty said. “We’re probably one of the few teams that can play their post guys man-to-man with our two bigs. We don’t have to dig down and double a lot, and that proved to be pretty effective.”

“I thought they came through the first two quarters and just wanted it more than us and played with more intensity and more passion,” EL coach Mike Adams said.

Therriault’s third trey of the first quarter gave the Eddies a 17-14 lead late in a rapid-fire opening period. But Morse answered with a 14-2 run despite losing their leader Kee, who went to the bench with his third foul a little over a minute into the second quarter.

James took over for Kee at the point and slowed the game down to Morse’s liking while it opened up a 28-19 lead. EL, meanwhile, scored just two points in a nine-minute stretch before Therriault and Bailey broke the cold streak with buckets to pull the Eddies back within five at halftime.

“I thought Alonzo James, our normal ‘3’ guard, did a great job of taking over the point and controlling the tempo,” Flaherty said. “Then I thought Ryan Chaney really dominated the glass for us in the first half and had some blocks.”

“They were just kind of toying with us offensively,” Adams said. “We’re chasing the ball all over the place and watching people dribble and running after them. You keep running long enough and you get into a good shot and that’s what happened.”

The Shipbuilders widened their lead to 12 when Kee set up Chaney for a three-point play late in the third quarter. They led by nine heading into the fourth, then got a little sloppy, turning the ball over six times while shooting just 3-for-11 from the field. But Kee (6-for-8) outshot EL (3-for-8) from the free throw line in the final quarter to provide what turned out to be the winning margin.

“We’re really waiting to build and take those steps to get better,” Adams said. “I thought we took a step against Oxford Hills (on Tuesday), and then, what’s the expression? One step forward, two steps back.”