Staff photo by Mike Buhler Kennett's Blake Parr (left) goes to the basket against Malden's Zech Payne during the first half of Monday's Bootheel Conference Tournament varsity boys' basketball championship game at Hayti. Kennett rallied from a 12-point third-quarter deficit to claim its first-ever Bootheel Conference Tournament title. [Click to enlarge]

HAYTI, Mo. -- A year ago, the Kennett Indians finished the season 4-20 and won just two Bootheel Conference games.

What a difference a year makes.

The Tribe capped an improbable run through the Bootheel Conference Tournament Monday night, avenging a pair of December losses to the Malden Green Wave with a 71-66 victory in the finals of the tourney.

The championship is the first Bootheel Conference Tournament boys' basketball title for Kennett, and came just two nights after the Tribe upset state-ranked and top-seeded Hayti in the semifinals.

"(We have) been searching for this for about a year and a half," Kennett coach Jim Vaughan said. "The kids have a really good idea of how it feels and what it takes to put it on the line after this week."

The Indians (9-10) did it in amazing fashion, turning a 12-point deficit early in the third quarter into a 52-51 lead by the end of the period.

Fueling the comeback was Tevin Hampton, who scored 10 of his 14 points in the period, including three 3-pointers.

When Hampton wasn't getting it done on offense, he was shining on the defensive end, holding Malden big man Leonard Burton to just four points after three quarters and 10 for the game.

"Leonard Burton was a non-factor for most of the game because Tevin Hampton took him out," said Vaughan. "He took the challenge and met it."

Kennett took a 62-57 lead on Jarvis Finley's layup with 3:51 left in the game, but the Green Wave rallied, cutting the Tribe's lead to 63-62 on Burton's free throws with 1:29 remaining.

Cameron Conder's basket with 1:25 to go pushed the lead up to 65-62, but a pair of baskets by Andy Matthews -- the last coming on a steal-and-layup -- gave Malden a 66-65 lead with 46 seconds left.

But the Tribe answered the bell, getting back-to-back field goals from Conder to retake the lead at 69-66 with 19 seconds to go before freshman point guard Randrick Caruthers sank a pair of free throws with eight seconds to go to ice the game.

"I feel like everyone came out and everyone played as a team," Conder said. "They had us down (but) we kept our composure and everyone did their role on defense and offense."

Conder had a big night for Kennett, scoring a team-high 18 points -- 14 of them in the second half.

"I feel like it wasn't just me -- everybody played together and I got passes," said Conder. "I passed and everyone just came out and handled everything."

The game was a battle throughout, although Malden scored the game's first five points and never trailed in the first half, building a nine-point lead twice in the second quarter and taking a 29-23 edge to the locker room on Nick Perkins' 3 at the first-half buzzer.

The Green Wave took that momentum into the third quarter, opening the period on a 6-0 run to go up 35-23 on Burton's bucket with 6:33 left in the period -- the biggest lead by either team Monday night.

However, the Indians outscored Malden 29-16 the rest of the period, finally taking their first lead of the night on Blake Parr's under-the-basket field goal with one second left in the quarter.

"We talked about before the game making possessions precious and winning the rebounding war," Vaughan said afterwards. "Those two factors alone -- we lost by six last time -- more than offset that tonight."

Finley added 10 points to join Conder and Hampton in double figures.

Perkins scored a game-high 26 points for the Green Wave, while Matthews chipped in 11 and Chad Hudson finished with 10.

Kennett begins one of its toughest stretches of the season tonight when it hosts state-ranked Cape-Notre Dame, the first of two state-ranked opponents remaining on the Indians' schedule.

In the meantime, however, Monday's win still feels great.

Staff photo by Mike Buhler Kennett's Jimmy Gooden (left) shoots over Malden's Dee Collier during Monday's Bootheel Conference Tournament varsity boys' basketball championship game at Hayti. [Click to enlarge]

"It feels good to actually start getting on a roll," Parr said. "It felt good when everything started clicking for us. I'm proud to say our team was the first to win a title in the Bootheel (Conference)."