Many of us were taught by Paul Lundberg at East Falmouth Elementary where he has been teaching the fourth grade for over 20 years. Then there are many of us who know him simply as “Coach” due to his long career as the FHS boy’s basketball coach. What many don’t know is that he is the mastermind of East Falmouth Night. You see Coach Lundberg has his players become pen pals with his students at Easty Elementary, he then invites the students of East Falmouth to a game where they get to meet their pen pal and get a t-shirt. Bottom line is Coach Lundberg is a stalwart steward of the center of the universe.

On Wednesday night Coach Lundberg and his Falmouth Boy’s Basketball team traveled to Mansfield for the first game of the MIAA division 2 state tournament. Falmouth would come into the tournament as a 12 seed, while Mansfield, seeded at number 5, would be the favorite.

Mansfield came out firing and jumped to an early 14-4 lead, but Falmouth managed to close the gap behind some phenomenal first half play from the likes of D.K. Johnson and Danny McGill. Throw in a Double Double from John Lavine, solid pay from Trevor Andrews, Zach (Salt) Weishar, Justin Mercier, Alessio Tranchell and Will Joyce, and Falmouth High was playing solid team basketball. Even the 02540s were playing like they were ballin’ on the streets of the 02536.

In the second half the tension was building, the lead was changing back and forth and the minutes were dwindling away. Fast forward to two minutes remaining in the game and after a powerhouse bucket by East Falmouth’s own Trevor Andrews, Falmouth took a 50-47 lead. Mansfield came back and drained a three to tie and the sold out crowd began to realize they were in for a battle for the ages.

On Falmouths next trip down the hardwood Nelson (Nelly) Baptiste (remember that name) was fouled and hit one of two from the charity stripe. After matching turnovers Mansfield drove to the hoop for two points and took the lead at 52-51 with 33 seconds left. Nelly quickly answered for Falmouth from the perimeter after a nice feed from D.K.

On the following posession Mansfield was fouled with 7 ticks remaining and hit the first of two free throws to tie the game at 53. Mansfield missed the second shot, Trevor came down with a monster board and Falmouth quickly called a timeout with 5.9 remaining. With the game tied Falmouth could not allow it to reach overtime. With 3 key players all in severe foul trouble, overtime was a death sentence for The Clippers.

Folks this is where it becomes magical, and while I know you are all drooling over the goats magically descriptive prose, we here at the go2536 have a treat for you… video footage. So without further ado we give you video of McGill inbounding to D.K. who dishes to Nelly (originally from Seacoast Shores, Holla), and the rest is history…

Falmouth wins!!! Falmouth Wins!!! Seacoast Shores Rules!!! Falmouth Wins!!!

Walpole beat Dartmouth in another upset which means that our local heroes will be playing at home on Saturday night at 7 p.m. Let’s show them what it happens when the 02536 has your back by rocking the Robert V. Antonucci field house like it has never been rocked before. (Hey we paid $86 million for it, we might as well use the damn thing)

Shout outs and thanks: Film courtesy of Renee Johnson, Coach Rogers for the descriptive re-cap, Coach Femino for remaining calm and getting the players to line up (classy work Femino), Coach Lundberg for keeping it real in the 02536, Coach Patterson (Master P) for cracking us up with his high knee hops at the end of the video, and to the loyal students that trekked up to the game and rushed the court in true old school fashion.

If you’d like to help get the word out about FHS’s magical run in the tournament click on the box with the f in it underneath where it says “post this on your social media page” and it will post this on your facebook wall.