Of the 56 points the Manhattan High boys basketball team scored Tuesday night, four may have given the Indians the momentum they needed for their 56-52 road win over Washburn Rural.

While divorced by time and worth only four points combined, the two baskets proved decisive.

The first was a three-fourths-court heave off the hands of junior Trevor Hudgins. As the second-quarter clock ticked closer to zero, Hudgins took a dribble, side-stepped a defender, and flung the ball some 75 feet before the buzzer sounded. The ball sailed through the air and popped through the net off the back rim. The MHS bench, thundering its support, mobbed Hudgins as the team jogged into the locker room at halftime.

The second also involved Hudgins, though on this occasion in a contrasting role. Midway through the third frame, Hudgins, behind the arc on the right wing, scanned the Junior Blues’ defense, locked eyes with senior forward Christian Carmichael on the baseline, and made the lob that basketball zealots have little trouble recognizing.

In one motion, Carmichael lept, snagged the ball with his right hand, and flushed it through. The bench, caged by the sideline on this episode, reacted similarly.

“Me and Trevor usually do that in practice,” Carmichael said. “We made eye contact. He threw it, so I just went up and did my job.”

Head coach Benji George said he had an eerie feeling about Hudgins’ desperation hoist.

“He was right next to me when he shot it,” George said. “When it left his hand, when the ball was in the air, it crossed my mind that that’s going in. I didn’t know if I believed it a whole lot, but it looked like it was going to go in.”

The two shots were highlights in a game that did not feature many like it. The Indians raced out to an 18-8 lead after the first quarter, but as was the trend of the contest, the Junior Blues made a resurgence that carried into in the final period.

Manhattan held Rural at arm’s length for much of the fourth quarter, but the gap narrowed in the closing two minutes. As the game neared its end, Washburn Rural’s Jenner Heckel, who finished with a game-high 21 points, missed the front end of a 1-and-1. After a few seconds of chaos underneath — greeted with like tumult among the crowd — Heckel repositioned himself on the left-wing three-point line and canned a triple.

With less than a minute remaining, Manhattan’s lead was down to 54-52.

Senior Gabe Awbrey met a similar fate on the other end, missing a free throw, but a tie-up on the ensuing Washburn Rural possession gave MHS possession and led to two free throws from Hudgins, who iced the game.

He said George implored his team late in the fourth frame to continue the battle.

“He told us it’s not over, and we need to keep on fighting,” Hudgins said. “‘This isn’t going to be easy. It’s at their house, on the road. Any Centennial League away game is going to be hard, so we need to play our hearts out.’”

In similar fashion, the Indians struggled to put away Topeka High last Friday, a blemish that after reappearing Tuesday night, George said will need to be cleaned up.

“I’m proud that we got the win, but I don’t want to make excuses,” he said. “We could have finished out an opponent tonight at the end, kind of like we did against Topeka High, and we need to do a little bit better job of it.”

Entering the second period trailing 18-8, Washburn Rural made up the ground quickly. The Junior Blues went on an 8-1 tear, closing the deficit to 21-18. MHS responded with five points, but an 8-0 Rural run got the Junior Blues to within one point.

Soon after, however, is when Hudgins drained the prayer.

George said he was content with his team’s mindset at the intermission.

“Getting themselves to a six-point lead and the fact that we held them to 25, I think at halftime our mind was right,” he said. “We felt like we were OK.”

Even after Carmichael’s violent slam and a triple from Awbrey, who totaled 12 points on the night, Rural hung around into the third frame. Baskets from Lukas McCalla and Jordan White kept Washburn Rural within six.

But as close as the Junior Blues crept in the fourth, the Indians did enough to hang on to improve to 8-0 on the season. It is the first time an MHS team has started with eight straight wins since 1989.

The starters provided nearly all of Manhattan’s scoring. Eight of Awbrey’s 12 came in the first period, Hudgins logged 14, junior Tommy Ekart totaled eight, Munsen finished with six, and the final starter — Carmichael — carried on a trend that began last week and posted 11 points, sticking back missed shots and knocking down stray jump shots.

“He’s been coachable; his attitude’s been right. That’s the biggest thing with Christian,” George said. “If he’s coachable, and if he’s giving energy, and his mind’s right and he’s being resilient about his own mistakes, then that’s the type of player he can be.”

Carmichael defended Hickel at times, a player who carried his team on the offensive end: no other Junior Blue finished in double figures.

But Rural scattered six triples across the game — four via Hickel — which, in addition to dribble-drives, gave Washburn Rural momentum.

“We knew they were going to shoot a ton of [threes]. We knew some of them were going to go in,” George said. “If you would have told me before the game, six threes, I would have taken it.

I thought they got the ball to the rim pretty easily at times, too. That was something that I wasn’t completely thrilled about.”

The Indians will get a few days of rest, however, before hosting Highland Park on Friday.

The history books go farther back on a potential 9-0 start. The last time MHS began a season with nine straight wins? 1955.