AHOSKIE – It came down to the final basket.

Northeastern High School escaped Hertford County with a 60-58 varsity girl’s basketball victory Tuesday night. The Eagles claimed victory in the Northeastern Coastal Conference opener for both schools when Kiana Rivers scored with 10 seconds to play.

Brandi Burden led three Lady Bears in double figures with 16, despite the setback. Desiree James added 14 and Kyana Rodgers chipped in 11. Taylor Jernigan led all scorers with 21 for the Eagles.

The game was close from start to finish with neither team able to get a double-digit lead throughout the contest.

HCHS led the contest by seven (45-38) heading into the final quarter, but Northeastern scored the first 10 points of the period to surge ahead 48-45. Te’a Moore Carver led the spurt with four of those points.

Burden stopped the spurt with a hoop for the Lady Bears and was followed by a bucket from Bailey Nicholas as HCHS went ahead 49-48.

Corvonne Griffin then scored for the Eagles, but was answered by a Rodgers hoop for the Bears.

Northeastern, however, got a three-pointer from Jernigan at the 2:20 mark and a hoop by Carver that made it 55-51 with less than two minutes to play.

HCHS scored the next five points on a hoop and a free throw from Rodgers and a bucket by Nicholas as they went ahead 56-55 with 1:20 to play.

Carver tied the game with a free throw 10 seconds later and then Jernigan scored with 30 ticks on the clock to give Northeastern the edge. Burden came down the floor and answered for the Lady Bears, tying the  game with 20 seconds to play and setting up the game-winning shot by Rivers.

Every player that scored for Northeastern was in double figures. In addition to Jernigan’s 21, the Eagles got 18 from Carver, 11 from Rivers and 10 from Griffin.

Vanessa Mitchell scored seven for Hertford County and Nicholas had six. Talisha Speight and Dyanni Hall rounded out the scoring with two each.

The loss dropped the Lady Bears to 2-5 overall and 0-1 in the league.

The game opened with an evenly matched first quarter. The largest lead was a 10-6 advantage for Northeastern, but the teams battled to a 16-all tie by the end of the period.

In the second quarter, Hertford County rolled off 11 unanswered to take a 27-18 lead, the largest of the game for either team. Burden and James led the run.

In the third quarter, the teams played evenly again as Northeastern chipped away at the lead and got it down to two before HCHS scored the final five points of the quarter to set up the fourth quarter run.