COEUR d'ALENE - Ty Higbie had a lot on his plate Friday night.

The 6-foot-5 Coeur d'Alene High senior forward was asked to guard Marcus Colbert, Post Falls' 5-11 point guard who is headed to Montana State next year.

Then, Higbie picked up the scoring pace in the second half, when the Vikings were asked to get a little tougher inside.

Then, oh by the way, he was asked to win the game at the end.

So he did.

Higbie took the inbounds pass from Devon Loy, curled off a screen from Travis Tackett, rose up and drilled a 3-pointer from the right wing at the buzzer to give fourth-ranked Coeur d'Alene a 51-48 victory over top-ranked Post Falls in a 5A Inland Empire League boys basketball thriller before an estimated 1,200 fans at Elmer Jordan Court.

"I was supposed to make it the first time (in the closing seconds), but it didn't happen," said Higbie, who finished with 19 points - 15 of those coming after halftime. "I got some good screens and, I don't know, it went in. I got some confidence from my teammates, so I was ready to make it.

“I kinda had an idea it was going in after I saw all the Blue Zoo (Coeur d’Alene High’s student section) Tebowing, so I figured that God was on my side,” he added.

“Ty Higbie’s a good ballhandler, a good one-on-one player,” Coeur d’Alene coach Kent Leiss said. “Ty played a great game tonight.”

Deon Watson had 19 points, seven rebounds and three blocked shots for Coeur d’Alene (9-3, 3-0), which leads the 5A IEL by one game over Lake City at the halfway point of league play. Watson went over the 1,000-point mark in his Viking career — the senior is now at 1,004 points.

Colbert scored a hard-earned 20 points for Post Falls (11-2, 1-2), which began the week undefeated, then lost at Lake City on Tuesday prior to playing at Coeur d’Alene.

“It’s obvious it’s us against the world — right now, the world’s winning,” Post Falls coach Mike McLean said. “We just have to take care of ourselves, regardless of the circumstances. We have to rebound better; we can’t have careless turnovers.”

Post Falls took control of the first half with a 10-0 second-quarter run, and led 22-14 at halftime. But Coeur d’Alene opened the third quarter with a 14-4 run to take a 28-26 lead with 3:17 left in the quarter, and the battle was on from there.

Coeur d’Alene took a 46-42 lead with 1:11 left when Loy cut to the basket, took a pass from Higbie and scored in the lane. But the Vikings couldn’t finish. Colbert rimmed in a step-back jumper from the top of the key with 49 seconds left. Watson missed a one-and-one with 44.8 seconds left, and Michael Hillman’s tip-in of a Colbert miss with 24 seconds left tied it and forced overtime.

Coeur d’Alene scored off the opening tip in OT — Watson tipping the ball to Joe Roletto for a layup — then didn’t score again in the 4-minute extra session until Higbie’s hoop.

Colbert tied it with 2:13 left on a layup following a Viking turnover. Coeur d’Alene had the ball the rest of the game. In the waning seconds, Higbie missed a spinning jumper in the lane, and the rebound deflected off a sea of hands and out of bounds. One official ruled it Post Falls ball, but was overruled by another official, and the Vikings had the ball with 2.8 seconds left.

“I was upset with us in the first half; I really thought Post Falls was tougher that we were,” Leiss said. “We didn’t really talk about anything too scientific at halftime, except just about being tougher and getting the basketball inside.”

Hillman had 12 points and seven rebounds, and Seth Anderson had 10 points and six boards for Post Falls. Higbie had seven rebounds and three assists, and Roletto had nine points and five steals.

“I thought Seth Anderson had a phenomenal game for us tonight. ... And I thought Michael Hillman was solid for us,” McLean said.

On Tuesday, Post Falls travels to Lewiston, and Coeur d’Alene visits Lakeland.

Post Falls 8 14 12 12 2 — 48

Coeur d’Alene 10 4 18 14 5 — 51

POST FALLS — Anderson 10, Valente 2, Thoreson 4, Colbert 20, Benner 0, Hillman 12, Koski 0.

COEUR d’ALENE — Tackett 0, Roletto 9, Daniels 0, Loy 2, Higbie 19, Watson 19, Blakley 2.