Photo by Jake McNeill: Marshall’s Noah Pieper (23) elevates for a fadeaway over a defender during the first half of a non-conference boys basketball game against Brandon Valley on Friday in Marshall.

MARSHALL — The Marshall boys basketball team’s late-game surge fell short of a win when the Tigers hosted Brandon Valley (S.D.) for a non-conference matchup on Friday night. Marshall scored 6 unanswered points to close out the game, but ran out of time to take the lead as they fell 59-58 to the Lynx.

Marshall trailed 59-52 after Briggs Knutson hit what appeared to be a dagger 3 with 40 seconds to play. The Tigers weren’t able to get a bucket to go down on the ensuing possession, forcing them to intentionally foul with 26.6 seconds left, but the Lynx went 0 for 2 from the free-throw line to give Marshall a chance.

Oliver Voigt gave home fans hope with a bucket on the offensive end, and the Lynx’s ensuing inbound pass resulted in a turnover after it was received by a player with his heel out of bounds. The Tigers responded by inbounding the ball to Voigt, who jumped up to catch the ball and threw it to Levi Maeyaert in the corner before he landed. Maeyeart’s 3 was no good, but Davion Xayarath got fouled on the offensive rebound attempt and made the first of his two attempts from the charity stripes to make it a one-possession game.

Marshall again intentionally fouled with 5.1 seconds to play and the Lynx again missed both attempts from the free-throw line. Maeyaert quickly hurled the offensive rebound downcourt to Voigt, who leapt up and shot a spinning turnaround 3 that found the bottom of the net to make it a 1-point game as the buzzer went off. The officials put 0.4 seconds back on the clock, but it wasn’t enough time for Marshall to make a play as the Lynx held on for the win.

Voigt finished the night with a game-high 23 points, shooting 10 of 18 from the field with a pair of 3-pointers, and made a major defensive impact with four blocks. Noah Pieper and Andrew Lee each also contributed 10 points while Xayarath added another 7.

Heading into the game, Marshall was expecting strong, physical defense from Brandon Valley, Marshall head coach Travis Carroll said. He added that the Lynx made it difficult for the Tigers to get into an offensive flow in the first half, though they recovered in the second.

“As the game went on, they wore us down, and we were able to wear them down a little bit too on that end, but I think Brandon Valley is just a very strong team on the defensive end of the floor,” Carroll said. “They’re going to make tonight on the offensive end a challenge for us, so we definitely needed to defend at a high level to stay in this type of game.”

The Tigers started the game with a 2-0 lead after the Lynx were assessed a technical foul for hanging on the rim during pregame warmups. Lee made both of the technical free throws and the Tigers were given possession of the ball to start the game.

Marshall trailed by as many as 12 points in the second half before getting back into form. The Tigers trimmed the deficit to one possession on a few occasions, but never were able to re-tie the game. They were also forced to sit Voigt late in the half after he picked up his fourth foul with five minutes to play.

Marshall took just over five minutes to get into the bonus in the second half, and got into the double-bonus shortly thereafter. The foul trouble, on the team and individual level, affected both sides, Carroll said. Specifically, he said that it forced Brandon Valley to back off a little defensively and also changed the personnel that each team was able to use in certain contexts.

“We had a couple of lapses in our zone and they were able to get some good looks on them … We just have to be able to adjust on the fly, and we could have adjusted on the fly a little bit better,” Carroll said.

Brandon Valley outrebounded Marshall 27-22 on the night behind some strong spurts of offensive rebounding. The Lynx had one possession in the first half where they got five offensive rebounds, finishing the night with a total of 10 to Marshall’s five, but were unable to convert on that specific instance.

There were some cases where Marshall may have been able to exert some more effort to get to a loose rebound despite being out of position, Carroll said, adding that rebounding is an effort stat and that the Tigers need to be able to match Brandon Valley’s physicality to compete with them on the boards.

Voigt led Marshall with nine rebounds in the game while Patrick Morman added another four. Voigt’s two offensive boards were also a team-high.

Ayuel Deng got off to a hot start for Brandon Valley, scoring each of the Lynx’s first 5 points. Marshall, meanwhile, didn’t score after the technical free throws until Pieper stopped and popped a fadeaway from the free-throw line to cut the deficit to 5-4 almost five minutes into the game.

Marshall regained the lead a few minutes later when Lee found Xayarath with a pass down low, and Xayarath was fouled to get to the line. He made the first of his free throws before missing the second, but Voigt got the offensive rebound and tapped it in to give Marshall a 7-5 edge.

The Tigers maintained a precarious cushion until Knutson hit a go-ahead 3 for the Lynx with six minutes left in the half, making the score 12-11. Morman responded by zooming to the basket for a layup to take the lead back, but Knutson hit another 3 on the ensuing possession to give the Lynx a 17-13 edge.

Brandon Valley built its lead up to 6 points before Voigt drove to the basket for a layup and swatted away a 3 on the defensive end in the final minutes, and Maeyaert hit Lee with a bounce pass for a bucket in the final minute to send Marshall into the locker room trailing 21-19.

Brandon Valley started the second half with 9 unanswered points and eventually built its lead up to 34-22 before Marshall began to regain some momentum.

Marshall falls to 5-4 on the season with the loss after having dropped four of its last five games. Three of those four losses came by one possession, and the other came by a score of 82-69 against Class 2A No. 1 Belle Plaine despite another strong finish from the Tigers.

The Tigers showed their ability to be gritty in late-game situations in that loss to Belle Plaine, Carroll said, but added that the team just needs to learn to communicate a bit better on the defensive end. He added that it’s been good to see how hard the kids have battled and put themselves in situations where they can steal a win late.

“It’s good to see our kids responding and not just being like, ‘We’re down 7 with 30 seconds left, this game’s over,'” Carroll said. “Our kids respond and fight til the end … We need that same type of effort that we saw tonight going into next week, because if we don’t it’s going to be hard to beat a team with the next two games we play … These types of games are going to show us areas that we need to continue to work on and get better at, and hopefully we can get on the right side of the score the next time we’re in a game like this.”

Marshall takes on a pair of ranked Class 3A teams next week, hosting No. 7 St. Peter (8-1) on Friday at 7:30 p.m. before making a quick turnaround to host No. 9 Mankato East (5-3) on Saturday at 3 p.m.