NATCHEZ &045; Alex Middleton couldn’t have been any luckier with two pockets full of four-leaf clovers and rabbit’s feet.

Middleton had a chance with 13 seconds left in overtime to make it a two-possession game with his Cathedral Green Wave holding a 42-40 lead. He missed the first one, but the ball actually got wedged between the corner of the rim and the backboard.

The call in that situation? Jump ball, and the Green Wave had the arrow.

After the place went nuts, the Wave in-bounded the ball, drew the foul and Matthew Hall delivered with two free throws to secure a 45-40 Division 7-1A win over Pelahatchie Friday night.

&uot;I told him that was the best miss I’ve ever seen,&uot; said Hall, who led the Wave with 20 points. &uot;I didn’t know what the ruling was. Coach was hollering jump ball, and it was our way. I can’t believe it happened.&uot;

It was the biggest break in an overtime period that was filled with momentum shifters, enough to make the steadiest of stomachs a little seasick. And the Chiefs couldn’t have been more snakebit at times in the fourth quarter and in the overtime on Middleton’s miss and plays earlier that went Cathedral’s way.

&uot;Bad luck,&uot; Pelahatchie head coach Avery Nobles said. &uot;We probably missed 15 free throws and layups. I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. We made a couple of plays, and they kept battling. They wanted it more. They looked a little more poised than us.&uot;

The Green Wave (2-2, 5-9) had to rally in the fourth quarter to force the overtime but capitalized in the extra period. Hall put in bucket with 2:47 left to take a three-point lead, but the Chiefs answered with a bucket from big man Joseph Thompson to cut it back to one at 41-40 at the 2:33 mark.

That’s when things started to get crazy. The Chiefs missed a shot from 3-point land, but the Wave missed the front end of a one-and-one. Matt Goss got the rebound in traffic and drew an over-the-back call on the Chiefs, and he went to the line a second later and hit one of two free throws for a 42-40 lead.

Pelahatchie’s Chris Gilbert missed another 3-point attempt, and the ball went out of bounds on the Chiefs.

&uot;We shot the ball pretty poorly tonight, but we hung in there,&uot; Cathedral head coach Peter Arnold said. &uot;I’ve been telling them all year we’re going to be in a lot of close games. We’re trying to stay loose and don’t get tight down the stretch. That’s how we were playing &045; we playing to win.

&uot;Good things happen to good teams. It’s like winning breeds winning and losing breeds losing. There’s more to it than just luck. We did the right things that got Alex to the free-throw line.&uot;

And the Wave did good things at the end of the fourth quarter to get back in the game and force the overtime. The Chiefs bounced between a 1-3-1 and 2-3 zone defense, but they stuck with the 2-3 in the fourth quarter and stretched it out to the perimeter to take away the outside shots.

The switch worked. The Green Wave didn’t get on the board in the fourth until Matt Goss put one off the glass at the 2:13 mark to trim the lead to 37-35.

&uot;I think the best thing about it is we’ve been in about five or six close games,&uot; Hall said. &uot;Having this game at home was huge, and the crowd was behind us. You could tell (Pelahatchie) hadn’t been in many. We knew what we wanted to do, and we did. Our overall team defense wasn’t that great tonight. Matt and Alex did hit their 3-pointers, and we had problems with that guy (Thompson) inside. In the fourth quarter they picked up their defense, but we made some crucial baskets in overtime.&uot;

The Green Wave had a 33-30 lead at the end of the third quarter and appeared to be on the verge of putting it away before the Chiefs answered. A bucket from Willie Mosely at the 5:03 mark put the lead in the Chiefs’ favor at 37-33 before Goss got the bucket to end a spell of almost three minutes when neither team scored.

Hall hit two free throws later to tie it up with 1:30 left, and both teams missed opportunities in the final minute to end the game. Goss missed a bucket from the corner at the buzzer.

&uot;They kept switching from the 1-3-1 to a 2-3 zone,&uot; Arnold said. &uot;We had a lot of good shots, but we didn’t knock any in. We just tried to stay close and not get out of our game. Having played several close games, we just tried to stick with what we do. We just didn’t shoot the ball well, which is out of character for our team. We’re normally a good-shooting team.&uot;