In front of a standing room only crowd at Selma High School, the Keith Bears defeated the Selma Saints 53-48 Friday night in both team’s season openers.

The Bears trailed 26-22 at halftime, but went on an 18-7 run in the third quarter to take a lead they never relinquished.

“In the second half, they gave a little more effort and won the lose balls, the cutting the baseline off, the 5-second calls — I think they just dug down a little deeper and won the game,” Keith head coach Tommy Tisdale said.

At halftime, Tisdale reminded his team to relax and play basketball.

“We were down four at the half,” Tisdale said. “I told my guys that we were actually doing a lot of what I wanted us to do, but we weren’t making basketball moves to the basket. I told the guys to settle down.”

After trailing 51-44 with under three minutes to play, Selma made a run to lose the gap. Keyshawn Ford and Aderick Moore scored to get the Saints within three.

After the Bears missed a free throw, Selma had the ball out of bounds underneath the Saints basket with 17.9 seconds left. But, when Ford caught the inbounds pass, his foot was out of bounds, resulting in a turnover.

From there, Keith’s Walton Young made two free throws and Selma was unable to score, leaving the final score at 53-48.

“The difference was the turnovers. We were up by four or five and they ended up scoring six or eight points uncontested,” Selma head coach Woodie Jackson said.

Young scored 14 points, including six during the Bears run in the third quarter to take the lead. Ford led the Saints with 13 points.