DURHAM — The shorthanded Person Rockets gave the league-leading Southern Durham Spartans a scare before succumbing, 48-43, in a low scoring Piedmont Athletic Conference boys’ basketball battle Friday night at the Southern High School gym.

Without several key players, Person still managed to claw back from a 13-point third quarter deficit and trailed by just three points (46-43) with 1:48 remaining in the contest.

Unfortunately, the Rockets would not score another point while the Spartans managed to tack on two free throws in the final five seconds to escape with the win.

The loss dropped the last-place Rockets to 2-10 in the PAC-6 and 9-12 overall. Meanwhile, Southern maintained its position atop the league standings at 10-2 (14-8 overall), and remained at least a game ahead of East Chapel Hill, which dropped out of a tie for first by losing to Hillside on Tuesday.

Friday’s affair was a far cry from the 22-point defeat Southern handed the Rockets at Person back in early January. The visitors decided to try something different this time around by doing their utmost to slow the tempo down and give themselves a better chance to win.

“We wanted to shorten the game and keep their possessions to a minimum,” said Rocket head coach Charles Dacus. “We clawed back and cut their lead down to nine at the half. Then we made adjustments at halftime, and they worked well for us. I’m really proud of the way the team battled tonight, and that’s a fact.”

Considering the loss in manpower over the past month, Dacus had a right to feel good about his team’s effort in holding the high-scoring Spartans to just 48 points.

“I think we did a great job of holding them to so few points,” he commented.

The only lead the Rockets held in the game was an early 2-0 advantage in the opening two minutes. Southern forged ahead 11-4 after one quarter and took a 30-21 lead into the intermission.

It appeared the Rockets were in trouble when they fell behind by 13 in the third quarter, but they got back to within two and eventually had a shot to tie the game on several occasions in the final two minutes.

For the first time this season, center Mike Williams finished as Person’s leading scorer with 13 points. Monroe Faulkner added 10 and Mark King and Tony Winstead had six each.

It was Winstead’s lowest point total all season, as the Spartans collapsed on him inside. Winstead, who had averaged more than 20 points a game over the past three weeks, did offset Southern’s defensive scheme by doing an effective job of finding open teammates. He dished out five assists in the game.

Ahmad Arthur had a strong outing by contributing five points, while Termain Scoggins (two points) and Rod Fuller (one) accounted for the remaining Rocket points.

Jamario Clayton canned 10 points, and Reese Wiggins finished with seven for the Spartans.

The Rockets complete the regular season next week with a conference road game at Jordan next Tuesday, and a home game against Hillside next Friday.

JVs fall to Spartans

The Person junior varsity boys fell to 3-9 in the PAC-6 with a 52-42 loss to Southern on Friday.

Anthony Winbush collected 12 points, and Cody Ellis and Dominique Banks added eight each for the Rockets, who are now 8-11 overall.