Candace Danz was not going to lose her final regular-season home game.
Danz, along with junior Madelyn Gary, helped rally Indian Creek from a 15-point deficit to edge Edgewood 49-48 in a thrilling nonconference girls basketball game that was not decided until the final seconds.
An Edgewood player missed two free throws with 1.4 seconds left that could have given the Mustangs the win or created overtime.
Instead, the Braves celebrated a win on senior night.
Danz had with 21 points and eight rebounds.
“That was a lot of pressure,” Danz said. “(Losing) would have been awful and heartbreaking, but we climbed back and won this one.”
Indian Creek takes a 16-4 record into Saturday’s regular-season finale at South Decatur. The Braves will win the Mid-Hoosier Conference outright with a victory.
As for Thursday’s game, the Braves didn’t get their first lead until the 6:14 mark of the fourth quarter.
That’s because Edgewood scored 20 first-quarter points and led by double digits most of the first half.
Sloppy play and missed scoring opportunities coupled with soft rebounding kept the Braves off-balance in the first half.
But they stayed calm and regrouped in the second.
“It wasn’t a pretty start, but honestly at halftime I felt we could still win, and I told the girls that I wasn’t stressing,” Indian Creek coach Dan Burkman said. “They got the confidence in them that they could win and started out the second half well.”
After the Braves got their first lead, the Mustangs tied the game and then retook the lead at 44-43 with 3:30 left.
That’s when Danz and Gary took over, along with some help from sophomore Addie Rund.
Danz hit nine of her game-high 21 points in the fourth quarter. Gary added 11 points in the period. And Rund hit four free throws late in the quarter to help keep the Braves in top.
Jasmine Carter led Edgewood (15-9) with 18 points. Teammate Serenah Morris added 14 points.
The win was the sixth straight for Braves.
