‘Shoot your shot’: Kapaun’s Corbin Johnson beats buzzer, Heights with last-second 3
Don’t let Corbin Johnson get to his spot.
After every practice for the Kapaun Mt. Carmel boys basketball team, the senior spends extra time refining his go-to move — the left-legged step-back from the right wing.
It’s a shot that Kapaun coach Steve Eck, a traditionalist, doesn’t always approve of. But it’s a shot he’s seen his best player make countless times in practice, so with Tuesday’s game at Wichita Heights tied in the final seconds, Eck looked Johnson straight in the eyes and told him to “shoot your shot.”
Johnson dribbled the length of the floor until he arrived at the spot where he calls home, the right wing, planting with his left leg and stepping back to create the separation he needed to swish the game-winning 3-pointer as the final buzzer sounded to lift Kapaun, ranked No. 3 in Class 5A, to a 56-53 win over Heights, ranked No. 4 in Class 6A.
“That’s been my shot ever since I was a little kid,” said Johnson, who scored a team-high 20 points. “Coach Eck doesn’t like me shooting it too much, but I’m pretty sure that he liked it that time.”
Before Heights made the game-tying free throw with 5.2 seconds left, Eck called timeout to let his team know the plan: Get the ball to Johnson and get out of the way.
In the aftermath of the City League thriller, Kapaun (16-3, 12-3 CL) extended its winning streak to 11 games while handing Heights (17-2, 14-1 CL) its first loss of league play.
“Corbin practices that exact shot almost every day in practice at the end, so he works on that shot,” Eck said. “Will he make it every time? No, he won’t. But all we needed was for him to hit it one time and he did.”
The buzzer-beating shot by Johnson was the clip that circulated around social media after the game, but the real treat of Tuesday’s game was two of the best players in the state on two of the best teams in the state trying to will their side to a victory.
Heights star guard Chase Robinson, who finished with a game-high 21 points, scored 14 of his team’s 16 points in the fourth quarter, including 11 straight to erase a 7-point deficit and put the Falcons in front 48-46 with 2:39 remaining.
That’s when Johnson pushed back, pulling up from four feet beyond the arc for a go-ahead 3-pointer followed by a fadeaway jumper for a 51-48 lead with 1:23 left. But that lead quickly evaporated, as Heights rallied back with two free throws from Robinson, immediately followed by a steal by Jalihn Timmons and a layup by Aven Mboule for a 52-51 lead with 43 seconds left.
Unbothered by the mistake against the press, Johnson swiftly found redemption with a right-handed floater to put Kapaun back on top 53-52 with 26 seconds left. Robinson again answered at the other end, as he was fouled driving to the basket with 5.2 seconds left and split a pair of free throws to tie the game.
That’s when Johnson made a beeline to his spot and delivered a nothing-but-net swish over a strong contest with his body’s momentum drifting to the right.
“As soon as it left my hand, I thought it might be going a little left,” Johnson said. “And then I saw it start heading toward the middle of the rim and I was like, ‘All right, it’s good.’”
Heights had already secured no worse than a share of the City League title, but Tuesday’s setback now opens the possibility for Northwest (15-4, 13-2 CL) to potentially share the title with a win in Thursday’s showdown at home against the Falcons.
Meanwhile, Kapaun has now successfully avenged all three of its losses in the first round of City League play. On Tuesday, the trio of Johnson, Dalian Blaise and Rocco Keller combined for 54 of the team’s 56 points.
“I’m just happy for the guys,” Eck said. “They’ve worked hard and we were pretty injured in the first half of the season. But now we’re healthy, so we can shoot the ball a little bit better and play a better defense.”
This story was originally published February 26, 2025 at 6:01 AM.
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