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By KEVIN ECKLEBERRY

Daily News

The LaGrange Grangers, in their first game in more than a week, outlasted visiting Camp Jewell House Academy 72-69 on Saturday.

LaGrange, which hadn’t played since beating Shaw 49-24 on Jan. 22, won its third consecutive game and improved to 9-6.

LaGrange will put its 2-1 Region 2-AAAA record on the line when it hosts Jordan on Tuesday, and it will visit the rival Troup Tigers on Friday.

The Camp Jewell game wasn’t originally on the schedule, and Veal was happy to be able to add it.

“I’m glad we got to play,” LaGrange head coach Mark Veal said. “If we’d been off until Tuesday, it would affect us.”

Kobe Jones and Javon Brown combined for more than half of LaGrange’s points on Saturday.

Brown led the Grangers with 21 points, with 13 points in the second half, and Jones made three 3-pointers and scored 20 points.

Mydarius Scott made two 3-pointers in the third quarter and finished with eight points, and Garrett Jacobsen scored six points.

“We had a couple of guys out, and we had different guys step in and play more meaningful roles in the clutch,” Veal said. “There were some positives. They got some experience, which is good.”

The Grangers, who were behind 34-30 at the half, were down by as many as seven points in the third quarter, but they fought back and cut their deficit to 53-51 heading to the final quarter.

The momentum carried over into the fourth quarter, and they built an eight-point lead with less than four minutes to play.

After Camp Jewell got within four, Brown completed a three-point play with 1:55 to play, and LaGrange was ahead 68-61.

The Panthers didn’t go away, though, and they cut the Grangers’ lead to 70-69 with eight seconds remaining.

After Scott knocked down two free throws with seven seconds left to give the Grangers a three-point lead, the Panthers missed a potential game-tying 3-point attempt.