Watch: Freshman Zach Swanson hits turnaround game-winning 3 to lift Toutle Lake to comeback win

Toutle Lake freshman Zach Swanson is already off to a hot start to his high school basketball career, playing for the Ducks as an eighth grader before stepping

Toutle Lake freshman Zach Swanson is already off to a hot start to his high school basketball career, playing for the Ducks as an eighth grader before stepping in this season as the team's leading scorer.

On Wednesday night, he mustered a bout of late game heroics.

Swanson hit an off-balance turnaround corner 3 with seconds left to lift the Ducks over Morton-White Pass 61-60 in a 2B Central League game on Wednesday night, snatching the game from its upset-happy when the Ducks had trailed for two quarters. 

“It was pretty neat,” head coach Eric Swanson said of his undefeated Ducks. “Onward and upward.”

Trailing by two with six seconds left, Toutle Lake had a baseline inbounds play all drawn up. But the inbound pass was tipped around until Swanson picked up the loose ball, gathered it behind the arc in the right corner, rose up and let the shot go with a defender’s hand in his face.

“It got kind of messed up,” Swanson said. “The ball got kicked around a bit, he grabbed it, took a shot and it found the bottom of the net.”

Amid the cheering frenzy of white jerseys after the final buzzer sounded the head coach delivered Zach Swanson, his son, an honest postgame message, one he posits most coaches would say to their son in that position. 

“Good shot, but too many turnovers,” he quipped.

Toutle Lake saw a 27-20 lead slip away in the second quarter and trailed the rest of the game — until Swanson’s 3-pointer. 

After the shot fell, 0.6 seconds remained on the clock. Morton-White Pass attempted a split-second full-court heave, but the ball was tipped around, queuing the buzzer.

Zach Swanson, an Oregon State baseball commit, is averaging around 20 points per game as a freshman, a team high. He had 36 on Saturday in a win over Onalaska, and is still playing his way into basketball shape coming off of a quick turnaround from the baseball season. Toutle Lake won a 2B district baseball title, and those playing basketball had just one practice before the first league game.

Toutle Lake is 5-0. Morton-White Pass, which handed Kalama its first loss of the season Monday, drops to 2-6.

“We played hard,” Eric Swanson said. “For the most part, we play hard every night, it’s tough to win in this league — in any sport. It’s one of the top-notch leagues in the state every year.”