The Marshall County Tigers completed the regular season sweep over intra-county rival Forrest with a 58-48 win in Friday night’s nightcap at Lewisburg.

The Tigers remained in first place in the District 12-AA standings by one game over Community with the win, but things tightened up as Vikings came up with a huge 61-57 overtime win over Nolensville at Unionville on Friday.

Marshall County travelled to Murfreesboro Central Magnet School (MCM) on Tuesday and hosts Nolensville in the regular season finale on Friday.

Community played at Giles County on Tuesday and travels to MCM Friday night.

Marshall County and Community have split its season series and the Vikings’ only other loss was at Nolensville on January 19.

The Tigers were determined not to let Forrest get in the way of their district title hopes as they came out red-hot versus the Rockets.

MCHS took an early 5-2 lead before exploding with a 12-0 run that included 3-pointers by Bryson Hughes and Omari Alred.

CJ Sanchez, who led the Rockets in the scoring column with 17 points, broke the Forrest scoring drought with 1:56 to play in the first quarter.

The Tigers were not finished as they put together a 5-0 mini-run with all the points coming in the low post by Jayden Hart, who also had 17 points as the high scorer for Marshall County.

Lewisburg took a commanding 22-4 lead to the second period and the Rockets spent the rest of the game trying to catch up.

“We just can't get behind to a good team like Marshall County and a great coach in Lavon King,” Forrest coach Corey Bishop said. “We need to be doing a better job of starting games, because we have struggled in that area as of late.”

With 1:44 remaining in the second quarter, the Tigers maintained their 18-point lead at 28-10 after a Hughes bucket before Forrest cut the lead to 13 points on a Walker Herring bucket in the low post, followed by a Brennan Mealer 3-pointer.

Hughes answered with a 3-pointer and the Tigers went on to lead 33-17 at the half.

Devonte Davis scored back-to-back buckets for MCHS to open up the third period and they kept on grinding, opening up a 26-point lead at 48-22 on an Alred basket late in the stanza.

The Rockets managed to cut the deficit to 19 points, entering the fourth period.

Sanchez went off to begin the fourth quarter, scoring eight points, including a pair of 3-pointers and he assisted on another bucket by Deason Jones as the Rockets put together a big 13-0 run to cut the MCHS lead to 50-44 with just over three minutes to play in the game.

“It was nice to see C.J. have such a good game because he has the potential of that every game,” Bishop said. “He came out determined and his effort is always there, so it was great to see him have the success that he did. We are very proud of him.”

Hart was fouled with 1:40 left in the game and buried both free throws for Marshall County’s first points of the period before Hunter Bennett made two charity shots to make it 52-46, but Hart put the game away with back-to-back buckets and the Tigers took the 10-point victory.

“We finished the third quarter strong, and started the fourth quarter as well as we have played in a couple of weeks,” Bishop said. “Give our guys credit for battling late, but we need to try and play more consistent basketball for the entirety of the game.”

The Rockets are in last place and winless in district contests this season with games left at Nolensville and at home versus Giles County.

“This week in practice and this upcoming weekend will be crucial to our success next week,” Bishop said. “We are going to start fine tuning areas that we have struggled in over the past couple of weeks in order to get ready for a huge game against our opponent next Tuesday night.”

“We've been in this situation before, and we need to be getting in the right mindset.”

Forrest 4 13 14 17-48

MCHS 22 11 17 8-58

Forrest (48): CJ Sanchez 17, Walker Herring 14, Brennan Mealer 5, Hunter Bennett 5, Deason Jones 4, Andrew Timmons 3.

Three-Point Goals (4): Sanchez 3, Mealer.

Free Throws (6-for-11): Bennett 3-for-4, Mealer 2-for-2, Timmons 1-for-2, Herring 0-for-3.

Marshall County (58): Jayden Hart 17, Bryson Hughes 15, Omari Alred 12, Devonte Davis 7, Kaamil Hazel 5, Carson Boyd 2.

Three-Point Goals (5): Hughes 2, Alred, Davis, Hazel.

Free Throws (11-for-18): Hart 3-for-7, Alred 3-for-6, Hazel 2-for-2, Boyd 2-for-2, Hughes 1-for-1.

Halftime Score: Marshall County 33, Forrest 17.