The First Baptist Christian School Lady Crusaders battled hard in a double-overtime thriller against visiting Tabernacle of Prayer Christian, but could not keep up the intensity, losing 49-41 on Thursday night.

“We ran out of steam at the end,” FBC head coach Kristy Patton said. “In the past, we’ve kind of lost close games on mental mistakes. I don’t think we made many mental mistakes this time. We were a lot cleaner towards the end of the game than we have been in the past, so it was improvement, definitely. Some things just didn’t quite fall our way. Really, I’m not unpleased.”

Neither team led by more than three points during the game until the last two minutes of the second overtime.

First Baptist found what looked like it could be a winning plan in the first half: Get the ball inside to junior center Caitlin Hankins so she can score. Turnovers plagued both teams, however, and Tabernacle of Prayer’s quickness was key.

It looked as though the Lady Crusaders would leave the first quarter up by one, but the Revelators grabbed a 7-6 lead. The home team similarly was by one going into the half, when TPC’s Mckaylyn Davis calmly lined up a three-pointer and drained it as the buzzer sounded.

Hankins ended up with 15 points and eight rebounds for the game, but her contributions came to an end with about 2:40 left in regulation when she fouled out.

Though she was gone, senior forward Brianna Longo immediately went to work, scoring to make it 29-29, but the Revelators made two free throws off a foul by her moments later. Next, Longo herself was fouled and she hit the free throw to tie the game again.

FBC junior guard Jenny Rombs was fouled as time expired, giving her a 1-and-1. If she hit the first free throw, she would get another, but the Lady Crusaders would win regardless. A miss, however, put the game into overtime.

First Baptist had its best string of plays in the first four-minute overtime. With TPC leading 34-33, FBC senior guard Janna Williams hit a jumper. The Lady Crusaders got the ball back, and junior guard Hannah Fagan followed it up with a one-handed shot off the glass for a 37-34 lead.

“We were excited, but we still had our head in the game when we got those shots real quick,” Williams said. “We need to start the game with that mentality.”

After a couple of misses from the line with 1:14 remaining, Williams hit a free throw with 6.6 seconds to go to send the game to the second overtime.

Longo scored inside for an early lead, but then the Revelators rattled off nine unanswered points, capped by another three from Davis to make it a decisive 47-40 with less than two minutes remaining.

Williams echoed Patton’s earlier thoughts on the end of the game.

“I think we just ran out of energy, and personally, I was hurting, because I have an injury,” she said.

“I didn’t have many extra bodies,” Patton said. “We have several injuries that we’re working with. Janna’s got an injury, she just fought through it, thank goodness. We got Julia (Jackson) who’s got injuries that are kind of recurring, so she can play for a little while, then she’s got to come out and recover.”

“I was upset that we lost, because I feel like we all played very hard,” Williams said.

Patton reflected on what the loss of Hankins meant for her team.

“It definitely hurts our rebounding,” she said. “I noticed a lot of times we had one side we covered well with rebounds, but if the ball fell on the other side, it was going to them every time. So we definitely missed her. Missing her for two minutes and missing her for 10 minutes is a whole lot different.”

Longo ended up with nine points and eight boards, Fagan had 10 assists and Williams had eight points.

TPC’s Crystal Stancil-Banks led all scorers with 21 points.

The Lady Crusaders (3-8, 0-3) travel this evening to play conference foe Virginia Beach Friends.