On February 29, 1964, Boone Trail High School held off Angier High School to win the longest high school basketball game on record, 54-52.
The game, that year’s Harnett County high school championship, was played in Campbell University’s Carter Gym. The gym was small in size and could seat only 947 spectators. There is no known record of how many were in attendance that day.
After the regulation game ended in a 44-44 tie, the two teams duked it out in 13 overtime sessions, and both teams used only the original five starting players in the game with no substitutions. The teams only scored a combined 18 points in the 13 overtime sessions, and there were nine sessions where neither team scored any points.
Boone Trail’s Frankie Stewart led all scorers with 29 points. Reportedly, one of the Angier players was so superstitious that the coaches told his team to not tell him they were in overtime number 13.
The game began at 8:30 p.m. Saturday and ended just before midnight. With the final buzzer, it just avoided the “no play on Sunday” rule.
Other related resources:
- Basketball and sports on NCpedia
- Photos of basketball from the State Archives
- Sports biographies from NCpedia
Images from UNC-Chapel Hill Libraries.