LUMBERTON- With just 2.6 seconds to play in overtime, Scotland's Mo Covington hobbled to the free throw line for two shots with his team up by a point.

Despite missing a pair 17 seconds earlier, the senior point guard would not be denied on this trip to the charity stripe.

Covington confidently sank a pair of free throws for his 33rd and 34th points of the night as the Scots escaped Robeson County with an 81-78 conference win over Lumberton.

"The coach is always telling me to shoot the ball with confidence, and the team was giving me the ball when I was open so I had the open looks," said Covington, who scored 23 points in the first half. "On the final trip to the line, I knew that I had to come through for the team."

Scotland (9-8, 3-1 SEC) got on the scoreboard before the game even started due to an error on the home team's (Lumberton) score-book. Lamont Browne swished the two free throws for the early lead.

The Pirates made it a 13-9 game on a deep two from Davonte Davis, who would cut the Scotland lead to three (15-12) on a 3-pointer.

Covington answered back with 3-point baskets on consecutive possessions to make a 21-12 game with 3:20 to play in the first. In the first quarter alone he scored 14 of the team's 28 points.

"We started out tonight like we have the past couple of games. We'd get on a big run, we'd get a big lead and think we've got it and then we'd lose our intensity," Scotland coach Mike Ritchie said. "It comes with experience and even though we have alot of seniors, we only have two or three that really played last year but I'm really proud of our guys effort. They hung in there at the end, and didn't lose their composure. We made some bad decisions out there but we also made some good ones."

A 3-point play from Dorian Davis and a three from Ryan Mitchell cut the Scots lead to 26-23 with under ten seconds left before a last-second basket from Scotland's Dominique Clark gave the Scots a five-point lead (28-23) after the first eight minutes of play.

Lumberton (5-10, 1-3 SEC) began the second on a 7-3 run, as two of Christian McRae's team-high 25 points cut the Scots lead to a point, before Kyle Rhoades gave the Pirates a one-point lead (32-31).

(Davonte) Davis made it a 35-33 game on a 3-point basket with 2:54 to play in the half. The teams would trade the lead three more times before four consecutive points from Otis Cromartie allowed the Scots to regain the lead, 43-41, going into half-time.

Cromartie came off the bench to score eight points and gave Scotland some valuable minutes.

"Otis has continued to get better for us as each game has gone on," said Ritchie of one of his key reserves.

In a hotly-contested third quarter, the two teams battled to three ties and seven lead changes with neither squad having more than a three-point lead, when Lumberton went up 50-47 with 6:01 to play in the quarter on a basket from (Davonte) Davis.

The teams went into the fourth quarter deadlocked at 59.

The Pirates got in the first jab of the final period when they went up 61-59 on a tip-in by (Davonte) Davis.

Like in the girl's game, a player was fouled on a 3-point attempt, this time it was a Scotland player that was fouled and Covington drained all three of his freebies to go up 64-61.

Lumberton tied it up at 70 when McRae went coast-to-coast for a lay-up with 2:15 to play in the game.

Covington put his team up 72-70 on his one field goal of the fourth before the Pirates answered back with two of their own on a slam dunk from (Davonte) Davis.

A tip-in from Clark with 20 seconds to play and a basket from Skipper with four seconds to play forced overtime as the teams would a play a four-minute extra period, with the game tied at 74.

Both teams traded the lead in the overtime before a lay-up from Clark made it 78-76 Scotland with two minutes to play.

Covington put his team up three (79-76) on 1-of-2 free throws.

McRae's 3-point attempt with 17 seconds left for Lumberton fell short and (Davonte) Davis, got the offensive rebound and opted to shoot the lay-up instead of attempting another three to cut the lead to 79-78.

"We wanted to go for the best possible shot that we could get and it happened to be a lay-up," Lumberton coach Ted Gaskins said on why they went for two instead of three following the miss.

Coming out of a time-out, Scotland could not inbound the ball and were forced to burn another time-out. They got the ball in on the second try and the Pirates immediately fouled Covington, setting up his game-winning free throws.

Covington finished the game with five 3-pointers. Dominique Clark finished with 17 points for Scotland while Browne joined his fellow senior teammates in double figures with 12.

Along with McRae, (Davonte) Davis added 17 with Mitchell chipping in 10.

The win moved the Scots into second place in the SEC and will host Richmond tonight. The Raiders (11-4, 2-2 SEC) dropped a 75-61 decision to Pinecrest on Friday. The Pirates will host county-rival, Purnell Swett.