Keriana Toole does some footwork against a Hattiesburg defender Tuesday night as she attempts to work her way inside.

Arianna Patton did her best Steph Curry impression, and the Meridian girls basketball team staved off an overtime period with a 55-52 win against Hattiesburg Tuesday night.

With less than 10 seconds remaining in the game and the score tied 52-52 after a field goal by the Lady Tigers, Patton dribbled the ball right in front of the coach’s box and, not seeing a lane to drive to the basket, threw up a Curry-like 3-point shot. The ball found the net just as time expired, leading to an exhilarated Lady Wildcats bench and a head coach who joked the game probably knocked five years off of her life.

“That’s just the basketball gods,” head coach Deneshia Faulkner said with a laugh.

The shot may have looked like a Hail Mary heave, but Patton said she was confident enough to pull the trigger with regulation about to end.

“My coach was telling me to attack, so all I thought in my head was, ‘Attack, attack, attack,’” Patton explained. “So I kind of spun, and I saw an opening, and I pulled it.”

There wasn’t much doubt in her mind the shot would fall, either.

“I looked at it, I was like, ‘Oh yeah, that’s going in,’” Patton said. “It was exciting, just wonderful.”

Meridian jumped out to a 9-2 lead early in the first quarter, but two 3-pointers by Hattiesburg’s Kenedi Walker allowed the Lady Tigers to stay within striking distance and end the opening period only trailing 12-8. That was the them for the entire game, as Meridian would go on runs but could never quite seem to put Hattiesburg away. The Lady Tigers got the lead for the first time off a 3-pointer by Ariona Coleman with 5:04 remaining in the third quarter, but Meridian kept fighting and took a 37-36 advantage heading into the fourth.

A back-and-forth final period saw Hattiesburg regain the lead 49-48 off an and-one by Melyia Grayson. A free throw by Chelsea Ulmer extended that lead to 50-48, but Patton tied it for Meridian with two free throws at the 1:16 mark. Meridian and Hattiesburg then exchanged field goals to tie it 52-52 before Patton’s game-winner.

It was a tough test for Meridian, one the Lady Wildcats passed largely due to the team discipline it displayed, Faulkner said.

“I think the biggest thing was, we stayed disciplined tonight,” Faulkner said. “We made a lot of errors, but we came in with a game plan, and outside of the win, the biggest thing I’m proud of is the girls stuck to the game plan and stayed focused, and I think they were pretty disciplined tonight.”

It also doesn’t hurt momentum that the win came against last year’s MHSAA Class 5A state champion.

“They’re a very well-coached, awesome team with awesome players, and for us to even be able to compete with a team of that caliber, it means a lot to the kids, because we have only one senior this year,” Faulkner said. “I just hope our kids can take this and grow from it.”

Said Patton, “It’ll give us more momentum, so it shows us that we can compete with other teams and bigger teams. Now that we know that, we’re going to take that and go with it.”

Patton led Meridian with 21 points, while Ti’Ian Boler scored 10 for the Lady Wildcats. Tyanna Clark chipped in with eight points, and Brianna Parker had seven points. 

The Meridian girls improved to 3-1 on the season. The boys also defeated Hattiesburg 46-41. Kyler Yarbrough led the Wildcats (3-2) with 13 points, while Traemond Pittman added 12 points. 

Meridian next hosts Raymond Nov. 20.