By Drew Williams/sports editor

NE Campus intramural basketball had another nail-biter finish Feb. 18 involving Team Hoeffner.

Chris Gracela, who scored 27 points and led all players in scoring, did all he could to will his team to victory after being down 16 points in the second half, but, ultimately, Team Hoeffner was beaten by Team Adams 59-57 after Gracela missed a half-court shot as the buzzer sounded.

Team Hoeffner lost last week in overtime 51-50 to Team Hernandez and have started off 0-2 despite having arguably the best player in the league in Gracela.

“I’m kind of carrying the team, but at the same time, you can’t win with just one guy,” Gracela said. “We need all five guys to contribute when they’re on the court.”

Gracela thinks nerves are playing a part in his team’s misfortunes.

“I play with these guys all the time at 24 Hour Fitness, at The Cage, and they always play better than this,” he said. “I think it may be stage fright from playing with the officials or something, but we just need to keep it simple and play basketball.”

Team Hernandez, on the other hand, advanced to 2-0 by defeating the Trojans 52-33.

Captain T.J. Hernandez said he played with a chip on his shoulder after reading last week’s article in The Collegian, which said that even though his team won, it was outplayed and outhustled by Team Hoeffner.

“I came out with a vengeance,” Hernandez said. “I had to prove the paper wrong.”

He did just that, scoring 20 points and leading the team in rebounds.

The final game was between Team Finnell and Team Reyes. After the game stayed close throughout, Team Finnell took control late and won the game 38-28 because of the play and leadership of Brandon Lewis.

“We hustled more, we rebounded more, and I took it upon my teammates to do a better job late in the game,” Lewis said.

Lewis said his team could have played much better, and he is disappointed his team is only off to a 1-1 start after missing out on its first game.

“We had to forfeit last week, so we were a little rusty since this was our first game,” he said.

A forfeit happened again, though, as the Brothers did not show up for their game. The Trent Killers got credit for the victory.

Gracela, Hernandez and Lewis will all try to improve their teams’ records when league play continues Feb. 25.