NAMPA — Post Falls' five beat Highland's two.

Or, more accurately, Post Falls, which uses at least 10 players each game, was too much for Highland's two stars.

The Highland Rams came in with the Division I recruit, another college-bound player after next season, and a whole lot of hype.

The Post Falls Trojans just had a bunch of kids that played hard, kept up the intensity and didn't care about any of that hype.

And that was plenty enough on this night.

"We knew two guys weren't going to beat us,” said Post Falls junior guard Max McCullough, who scored 19 points as the Trojans outlasted Highland of Pocatello 67-62 in overtime in the championship game of the state 5A boys basketball tournament Saturday night at the Ford Idaho Center.

Dalton Thompson added 16 points and eight rebounds, Luke Anderson had 13 points and Jack Millsap chipped in 12 points and 10 boards as the Trojans (25-1) won their second state title in the past six years, and fourth in program history.

Highland 6-foot senior guard Stefan Gonzalez, who has signed with Saint Mary's, scored 31 points on 12-of-28 shooting. Junior wing Connor Harding (6-5), who has interest from Division I schools, added 27 points for the Rams (22-3). But Highland got only four other points from the rest of the team.

"You can't stop those two guys," said eighth-year Post Falls coach Mike McLean, who won his second state title at his alma mater. "They are who they are. Guys like that, you contain. After Gonzalez hit tough shot after tough shot, I thought it might not be our night. But we were going to try to wear those guys down and maybe down the stretch, those shots would be a little bit shorter than they were earlier in the game.”

At the beginning of the game, it was McCullough who stole the show. The quick 5-9 guard scored 13 points in the first quarter on 5-of-6 shooting, including 2 of 2 on 3-pointers, as Post Falls jumped out to leads of 10-0, 14-2 and 19-5 in the first quarter.

"It just felt like everything was falling," McCullough said. "I just felt like nobody could guard me. Everything was going down. I just wanted to keep it going, and give our team the biggest lead possible."

But Highland opened the second quarter with a 14-0 run. Gonzalez had 11 of those points, including a couple of deep 3s from somewhere near Middleton, as Highland took a 23-20 lead with 4:48 left in the half.

After that exchange of haymakers by the two teams, it was game on.

Post Falls closed the half on a 9-0 run, with Anderson sinking two 3-pointers, Thompson one, and the Trojans led 33-28 at the break.

The Trojans led by seven in the third quarter, but Highland tied it at 39 early in the fourth, and it was never more than a three-point game the rest of the quarter.

Gonzalez hit a 3 with just under 3 minutes to play to put Highland up 52-51. It would turn out to be his last points of the game. Thompson, who played AAU ball with Gonzalez a couple of summers ago and guarded him in Saturday's title game, answered with a 3 over his former AAU teammate. Harding's runner with 1:53 left tied it at 54.

Highland had the last shot in regulation and posted up Gonzalez, but his fallaway in the paint in the waning seconds was short off the front of the rim.

"Dalton battled him," McLean said. "I asked Dalton just to 'hand up,’ and if he makes a good shot, just congratulate him.”

In overtime, McCullough drove and fed Anderson for a 3-pointer from the left corner with 3:12 left, putting the Trojans up 57-54. As it turned out, Post Falls was never headed after that. McCullough, who had scored just two points since that first-quarter outburst, hit a pair of big baskets in overtime.

With Post Falls up 65-62, McCullough missed two free throws, but Thompson knifed in and rebounded the second miss. McLean called it the "play of the game." He was fouled and drilled two free throws with 9.5 seconds left to seal the win.

"I think we're a lot deeper than they are," Thompson said. "Their guys were tired at the end, and we were still pumping."

Millsap and Jake Blakney (7 points, 5 rebounds) were beasts on the boards for Post Falls, which out-rebounded Highland 42-25.

"We're a firm believer that, one or two guys are not going to beat our program," McLean said. "We may not have two guys that can score and do what they do, but we believe as a program, you're not going to beat us with just two. We believe our program is strong enough to withstand two guys, and just battle for everything else we can get."

"It (winning a state title) feels unreal," said Anderson, who hit 3 of 4 3-pointers. “We're 11 deep; we've believed in that since Day 1. We were not going to let two guys beat us. They are great players, but we used our bench to help us out."

"We knew they couldn't guard all of us," McCullough added. "If they stop one of us, we have 10 more guys that can do the same thing."

Gonzalez and Harding combined to take 41 of Highland's 49 shots. Gonzalez was 6 of 11 from the field (3 of 7 from 3-point range) in the first half, and 6 of 17 from the field (1 of 7 from 3-point range) in the second half.

"When coach McLean told me I would be guarding him, I took it as a challenge," Thompson said. "I just wanted to do the best for my team, and try to shut him down."

Highland was seeking its first state title since 1996, and fifth overall.

Gonzalez was gracious in defeat, praising Post Falls for its clutch shooting, and noting the Trojans' experience in tough games gave them an edge over the Rams, who were not tested in their first two games at state.

"The last two games, everybody on our team was knocking down shots, which got Connor and I free,” Gonzalez said. "Unfortunately tonight, our hot shooting didn't carry over as much, and I felt like Connor and I were trying to take the game over, sometimes took some bad shots at times, but that's what you've got to do — you have to do whatever you can to win.”

And while those two did most of the work for Highland, Post Falls kept running guys in and out, keeping them fresh.

"I knew they played the whole game," McLean said. "And we tried to rest our main guys — Dalton Thompson, who was guarding Gonzalez, and Jack Millsap, who was guarding Harding — at the end of quarters with some of our guys coming off the bench, and I thought that helped us down the stretch. And we tried not to let anybody else get anything easy."

Post Falls 20 13 6 15 13 — 67

Highland 9 19 7 19 8 — 62

POST FALLS — McLean 0, W. Millsap 0, McCullough 19, Anderson 13, English 0, Pfennigs 0, Thompson 16, Hillman 0, J. Millsap 12, Blakney 7. Totals 23-53 12-22 67.

HIGHLAND — Gonzalez 31, Frazier-Flores 0, Roper 0, Harding 27, Woodward 0, Manu 4, Eborn 0, West 0. Totals 23-49 9-18 62.