JACKSON — Vicksburg looked like a beaten team. The crowd was silent, the green shakers hanging limply in the air rife with the stench of possible shocking defeat.

When Pascagoula guard Paul Plainer converted two free throws after an intentional foul by Vicksburg point guard Dominique Brown on a made layup, the Panthers owned a 44-39 lead and all the momentum with just over 5 minutes to play.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Looking at Tuesday’s Class 6A semifinal against Pascagoula, Vicksburg was the odds-on favorite. The game up to that point was a shock to the system for the green-clad fans in the Big House.

The Gators were battle-tested with a schedule populated with quality wins over the state’s heavyweights, while Pascagoula had done little against Coast heavyweights Biloxi and Gulfport.

As the cliché goes, games aren’t played on paper. Pascagoula put the clamps on the Gators, frustrating speedy Brown into a six-turnover, 2-of-12 shooting performance. They kept the runouts to a minimum and pestered VHS big man Mychal Ammons down low.

But Vicksburg coach Dellie C. Robinson made an adjustment to get Ammons the ball farther away from the basket. The Gators also began to apply the clamps with a suffocating press that the young Panthers couldn’t handle.

In the final 2 minutes of regulation and in the rest of OT, the Gators showed which team had veterans and which had the youngsters. Missed free throws and turnovers proved costly for Pascagoula.

In a test of wills, Vicksburg — led by Ammons’ 13 of a game-high 28 points in the fourth quarter and overtime — imposed its will while Pascagoula wilted in the big spotlight. The Gators outscored the Panthers 12-1 in the extra frame.

“We had it won,” Pascagoula coach Keith Robinson said. “We just didn’t close it out. Our inability to handle the pressure really hurt us. We missed some free throws and it came back to bite us. They took over, especially in overtime.”

But the Gators believe that they were their own worst enemy in this game. Instead of taking the shots the defense offered, the Gators were forcing shots from those the defense denied. The Gators hit only 30 percent from the field in the first half.

“I don’t think it was what they were doing to us,” Vicksburg coach Dellie C. Robinson said. “I thought we looked stunned at first. We made some bad passes and I guess we looked up at the big ceiling and it messed with us. Pascagoula wasn’t doing anything but doing what everyone else does. Play Mike (Ammons) tough. Play Willie Gibbs tough and making everyone else do the scoring. I thought the kids were looking to Mike and Willie Gibbs too much.”

Now the spotlight shifts to Saturday’s title game against Meridian and superstar Rodney Hood. The Gators have their mulligan out of the way and will need to be at their best, no matter what.

Everything has pointed to the state’s two best players, Ammons and Hood, on the state’s two best teams meeting for the Golden Ball.

Now fans get the title game they wanted all along.

The Gators took all of the best of Pascagoula had to offer. And now the never-say-die attitude that served them in thwarting Pascagoula’s upset bid will be needed again if they want to bring home Vicksburg’s first title since 2003.

If pulling out a squeaker against a well-coached, determined foe was Vicksburg at its worst, it’ll be scary to see what constitutes the Gators’ best.

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Steve Wilson is sports editor of The Vicksburg Post. You can follow him on Twitter at vpsportseditor. He can be reached at 601-636-4545, ext. 142 or at swilson@vicksburgpost.com.