In a game that was extremely tight throughout, Kirkwood took advantage of a late Lindbergh turnover to win, 51-49, as junior guard Justin Byrd made two free throws with 6.8 seconds left.

The teams played on Tuesday in the quarterfinals of the loser's bracket of the Meramec Holiday Festival Tournament. After the Pioneers gained possession with 13 seconds left, Byrd drove the lane, got fouled and made the clutch shots. The Flyers missed a shot as time expired.

"There were so many changes of emotion in the last two minutes of the fourth quarter," said Kirkwood coach Bill Gunn. "I'm just happy with our kids that, no matter what, we still played through it and got stops when we needed to. And we hit free throws when we needed to.

"We've talked about the same things, being physically tough and mentally tough. I thought physically we were stronger with the ball at times. But the big thing was mentally, when calls didn't go our way, we didn't pout about it; we played through it. And we missed some free throws early but we made some big ones late."

Junior guard Clark Randall hit four 3-pointers and had a team-high 15 points for Kirkwood, which got at least five points from six different players. Kirkwood advances to the consolation semifinals on Wednesday.

If Lindbergh coach Jason Wolfard had a chance to do things over again, he likely would have called a timeout with his club holding the ball with 20 seconds left and the score tied.

Instead of setting up for the last shot, Wolfard called out a play from the sidelines and decided to trust his players in the final seconds. But the plan backfired when the ball slipped through the hands of senior forward Charley Mueller and into the hands of the Kirkwood defense.

"When you look back, it was probably my fault," Wolfard said. "We should have called a timeout and made sure we took the last shot no matter what. We had the play we wanted. We had the look we wanted. It just went through our hands and they got it, and we put them on the free-throw line at the other end and they hit free throws when they needed to."

Neither team led by more than four points the entire game, as a back-and-forth battle between the two longtime rivals continued until the final buzzer. Lindbergh trailed by one at halftime and by three at the end of the third quarter before using a 7-0 run to take a 40-36 lead early in the fourth quarter.

Kirkwood took a 47-43 lead with 2:14 remaining on a pair of free throws by Randall. Mueller followed with a free throw and senior center Jared Haenni made a layup to cut the Pioneers lead to one at 47-46 with 1:45 to play.

Kirkwood senior guard Stefan Moore opened the door for Lindbergh, missing both free throws with just over a minute to play. Lindbergh junior guard Blake Welch hit one of two free throws to tie the game at 47 with 55.6 seconds, before a Kirkwood turnover led to two free throws by Haenni, which put the Flyers up 49-47.

Byrd hit two free throws to tie the game with 27.6 seconds left, before Wolfard elected not to call timeout and set up a play. The Flyers intended to get the ball to Mueller, who had a game-high 17 points, but the ball fell out of his hands and Kirkwood then won the game at the foul line.

On the last play that led to Byrd's free throws, Gunn said, "You just want to go hard to the basket and hopefully you either get a good shot or you get to the free-throw line. I thought our kids got stops when we had to and then he hit those big free throws."