Marietta’s Trey Hawkins (3) puts up a shot as Warren’s Shawn Adams (12) and Blake Grimes defend during Tuesday’s tournament game at Sutton Gym. (Photo by Mike Morrison)

MARIETTA — Beating any team three times in the same season is quite a challenge, let alone your arch rival.

The No. 4 seeded Marietta Tigers completed the season sweep Tuesday night with a hard fought 66-60 win over the No. 5-seed Warren Warriors at Sutton Gymnasium in an OHSAA Division III, District Quarterfinal.

The heavily-favored Tigers actually trailed at the end of the third quarter but found a way to get the job done led by a huge second half by senior Trey Hawkins.

“It was a tough game and I’m glad the fans enjoyed because I’m not sure the coaches did,” joked a relieved Tiger head coach Austin Gardner. “Great teams find a way to win and we’ve been in that position quite a bit this year. There was no panic, just a sense of urgency. I’m super proud of our guys for getting it done.”

The Tigers have a whole host of outstanding shooters on their roster but simply could not cash in from long distance early on as they missed their first 10 shots from behind the arc.

Warren’s Caleb Tullius attacks the basket during Tuesday’s tournament game against Marietta at Sutton Gym. (Photo by Mike Morrison)

As ice cold as the Tigers were early on, the Warriors were red-hot as they knocked down 8-of-9 shots from behind the arc in the opening half.

Perhaps saving the Tigers early on was their ability to force turnovers on defense.

After the Warriors jumped out to a 4-2 lead, the Tigers got consecutive steals and buckets in transition by Hawkins, Lucas Miller and Zaiden Wittekind with the latter finishing with a two-handed dunk.

The Warriors quickly answered with three-pointers by Caleb Tullius, Shawn Adams and Liam Grosselin to open up a five-point lead of their own.

Shot No. 11 proved to be the lucky one for the Tigers as freshman Graesyn Moat canned a triple and Hawkins closed out the quarter with another one to tie the game at 16-16.

Marietta’s Graesyn Moat (11) goes up for a shot as Warren’s Liam Grosselin (4) defends during Tuesday’s tournament game at Sutton Gym. (Photo by Mike Morrison)

Both teams had no trouble putting the ball in the bucket in the second quarter as they played to a 23-23 tie to keep the score knotted at 39-39 at the break.

Warren sophomore Jackson Perdue, recovering from an injury and playing his first game in a few weeks, provided the Warriors with a spark in the second quarter by tossing in seven points off of the bench while Tiger junior Trenton McVey did the same for his team by scoring eight.

Midway through the third quarter the Warriors got back-to-back buckets by Tullius to open up a three-point lead before the Tigers got a huge play by Moat on both ends of the court.

The freshman blocked a Warrior shot on the defensive end and then ended up cashing in on the other end off of an assist from Hawkins to cut the lead to one.

As they would for most of the game, the Warriors had an answer as Perdue connected from behind the arc.

After McVey knocked down his second three-pointer of the game for the Tigers, Perdue closed out the third quarter with an old-fashioned three-point play to give the Warriors a 54-50 lead into the final quarter.

The Warriors tried to take the air out of the ball in the final quarter and were able to take almost two minutes off of the clock before Hawkins came up with a steal and was fouled on the other end.

Hawkins made both free throws to cut the lead to two.

After Warren came up empty on their next possession the Tigers had a chance to tie but Perdue came up with a steal only to have Wittekind catch him from behind and come up with a huge blocked shot.

Owen Riley was fouled on the Tigers next possession and converted one-of-two at the foul line before Blake Grimes grabbed an offensive board and put it back in to push the lead back to 56-53 with four minutes to play.

After struggling with their perimeter shooting for much of the night, the Tigers put the ball into Hawkins’ hands and the senior put pressure on the Warren defense by driving strong to the bucket.

Hawkins drew fouls on consecutive Marietta possessions and made all four free throws to put the Tigers in front by a point with two-and-a-half minutes to play.

On the next Tiger possession, Hawkins once again drove to the bucket, only this time he kicked it out to Moat who knocked down a huge three-pointer to give the Tigers a 60-56 lead.

“We had some guys that didn’t have their best nights and Graesyn Moat for a freshman came up big time,” said Hawkins. “Our guys trust him and he plays like a senior and he gets coached like one too.”

The Warriors weren’t ready to go down quite yet as they answered with back-to-back buckets by Perdue to tie things up once again at 60-60 with less than two minutes to play.

Hawkins was fouled again and made the first of his two free throws. He missed the second, Wittekind came up with a huge offensive board.

Wittekind was also fouled and made one-of-two at the charity stripe, extending the lead to two.

The Warriors missed a three-pointer and once again Wittekind came up with the rebound.

The Tiger senior made one-of two freebies before Hawkins came up with a huge steal on the other end to take away the Warriors’ shot at a three-pointer to potentially tie the game.

Hawkins finished things off at the foul-line, making three-out-of four in the closing seconds to secure the hard-fought win for the Tigers.

“It took staying together as a team and never giving up,” said Hawkins of the win. “We just had to stay patient and stay together and we did.”

On a night where the Tigers’ leading scorers Riley and Wittekind were limited to just 11 points between them, Hawkins came up huge by tossing in a game-high 23 points while also coming up with four steals and three assists.

“Trey (Hawkins) has went through a lot missing seven games this year and has spent a ton of time working in the gym improving his game,” said Gardner. “He was a huge help tonight offensively and defensively and ran the show for us. He was the man tonight.”

The Tigers got 26 points off of their bench, with Moat finishing with 15 and McVey with 11.

Perdue led the Warriors with 19 points while Tullius added 15.

Warren finished the game shooting a blistering 67 percent from behind the arc (10-15) but still came up short.

Warrior head coach Blane Maddox was extremely proud of his team’s efforts and the improvement they made from the beginning of the season to the end.

“Our guys played their butts off and I’m so proud of them,” said Maddox, whose team eliminated the Tigers a season ago. “Maybe a couple more buckets and a couple of more rebounds and a couple of less turnovers and we’d be going to The Convo, but we gave it our all against a very, very good basketball team on their home court.”

The Warriors season comes to a close with a 12-11 mark.

“They (Marietta) have so many options and the freshman (Moat) stepped in there and hit some big shots and Hawkins just played outstanding,” said Maddox. “Everybody thought we were going to get drilled but I didn’t believe that and the kids didn’t believe that. We came in here to win and almost did.”

The Tigers (19-4) will now move onto the Convocation Center in Athens Friday night at 6:15 p.m. to take on top-seeded Miami Trace, the team that eliminated Warren a season ago.

“Our goal has been to get to The Convo since the start of the year and now we’ve got that done,” said Hawkins. “We are going to play a great team and it’s going to be a battle, but we are going to be ready.”