EAST ST. LOUIS • A 6-foot-3 forward, Isaac Bouquet isn't known as a 3-point shooter.
On Wednesday night, Bouquet connected on the game-winner as he drained a 19-footer from the right wing to give O'Fallon a 57-56 upset win at East St. Louis in a Southwestern Conference game.
The Panthers snapped their two-game losing streak and improved to 12-4 overall and 4-3 in the conference. East St. Louis, No. 3 in the STLhighschoolsports.com large-schools rankings and No. 2 in the Illinois Associated Press Class 3A state poll, fell to 14-3 and 6-1.
Roy Bullock III led O'Fallon with 17 points. Michael Jackson chipped in 15, and Elijah Kinmon added nine.
Deshawn Munson's game-high 18 points paced East St. Louis. Brandon Johnson added 12, and Montez Williams 11. Both Munson and Williams fouled out.
"I knew it wasn't going in and out," said Bouquet, who entered the game with five 3-pointers from 15 attempts. "I didn't know what to think when it went in. I knew I had to get back on defense because there was time left. We've got a long way to go. I can shoot it."
Bouquet, who finished with eight points, put his team in front 57-56 with 45.2 seconds to go. The Panthers had been trailing 56-54 after Johnson made two foul shots after point guard Bullock fouled out with 1:06 remaining.
"Isaac made such a huge shot," O'Fallon coach Rick Gibson said. "He stepped up and made it. It seems like he's finally getting into basketball shape. He's playing pretty well lately. He's a gamer. He's up for big games. That was a big shot."
Losing Bullock on fouls wasn't the unsettling situation is could half been. As it turned out, Gibson had been practicing the last couple of days without Bullock just in case a situations like Wednesday's popped up.
"I said there's going to come a time when Bullock is not going to be in there ... something's going to happen," Gibson said.
Before Bouquet's winner, the game was back and forth the entire night. O'Fallon held the night's biggest lead, 42-34, after a Jackson basket with 3:24 to go in the third quarter, but East. St. Louis pulled to within 48-47 by the end of the third quarter.
In the fourth quarter, the teams traded baskets and foul shots. East St. Louis' ran into trouble when Munson picked up his fourth foul against Kinmon at the 2:59 mark and then drew a technical foul for protesting the call with the Flyers in front 54-53.
Kinmon missed the front end of a one-and-one foul shot, and Bullock made only one of two free throws to tie the score.
Johnson then made his two foul shots to put his team up 56-54 setting the stage for Bouquet's heroics. O'Fallon then survived two running 6-foot one-handers by Johnson, the last coming with one second remaining.
"We had all the looks we needed, and we had the right matchups that we wanted," Flyers coach Ray Coleman said. "The ball just wasn't going in. Brandon's the captain, and we want the ball in his hands. Deshawn wasn't on the floor. We did what we had to do. We had a good plan to attack the basket. We got the look, it just didn't go down."
