PANAMA CITY — Devon Baulkman already had set his team’s all-time single-game scoring record.
All that remained for the Gulf Coast sophomore was putting a final stamp on his record-breaking performance.
Baulkman set a new Commodores record with 48 points, and he drilled a contested 17-footer with 2.9 seconds left in overtime for the gamewinner as GC outlasted Northwest Florida State 87-85 on Saturday night in a Panhandle Conference men’s basketball game.
The Commodores (16-8, 4-3) pulled into a tie for second place in the conference with NWF State (19-4, 4-3), and both teams trail first-place Chipola by one game in the Panhandle standings. Chipola defeated Tallahassee 63-57.
Farad Cobb buried a 3-pointer with less than a second left in regulation to send the game into overtime, and the Raiders scored the first five points in overtime to take an 83-78 lead with just over three minutes left in the contest.
Cobb made two free throws for an 85-80 Raider lead with 1:51 left, but GC held the Raiders scoreless from that point and opened the door for a comeback.
Dwane Miner’s layin closed GC’s gap to 85-82 with 1:10 remaining, and Baulkman fired in a 3-pointer from the top of the arc with 21 seconds left to tie the game. After NWF State misfired on the other end with nine seconds left, Baulkman advanced the ball to the left wing, where he banked the ball off the backboard and sent it through the hoop for the clinching shot.
“We lost a few games early in the year because we didn’t have him,” Powell said, noting a shoulder injury Baulkman suffered in the season opener that sidelined him for a few weeks. “Overall I thought we handled it pretty well for a young team, but let’s be honest, we missed him.
“He came back, and slowly and bit by bit he has become the player we thought for sure he would be when we recruited him.”
Baulkman broke the scoring record of 44 points previously set by Jose Rodrigues last year.
The Commodores made all six of their free throw attempts in the final 33 seconds of the second half, but NWF State would not be deterred. After Elliott Cole’s two free throws gave GC a 78-75 edge with eight seconds left, Cobb found just enough room in the corner to launch a game-tying 3-pointer with seven-tenths of a second left.
Basil Deveaux was the only other GC player to score in double figures with 10 points.
Cobb paced NWF State with 22 points, and Bell had 19.
GC blitzed the Raiders early in the game by opening an 18-8 lead, but NWF State outscored the Commodores 18-7 over the next eight minutes to pull ahead 26-25 on Shaquille Johnson’s free throw.
Baulkman and Deveaux converted layups in the final 45 seconds of the first half for the Commodores, and GC went into the locker room clinging to a 33-32 lead.
Baulkman scored 16 of his points in the first half, and Deveaux added six. Cobb and Benji Bell combined for 19 points through the first 20 minutes for NWF State.
Anton Waters exited the game with 1:53 left in the second half after taking the brunt of the impact from a collision with the Raiders’ Tevin Glass as Glass drove the baseline to the basket.