Coming off a season-opening loss to Bellarmine Prep, Mercer Island boys basketball was looking to bounce back in their home opener against Newport Saturday night. And the Islanders appeared poised to do so, rallying from a first-half deficit to take a one-point lead in the closing seconds of Saturday’s contest against the Knights. But the effort came one defensive stop short.

Drawing a trip to the foul line with 3.8 seconds remaining in regulation, Newport’s Jake Higgins sank two free throws to give the Knights a 55-54 win over the Islanders Saturday at Mercer Island High School, dropping Mercer Island to 0-2 this season.

Mercer Island coach Gavin Cree said afterward he felt the Islanders were one defensive rebound away from their first win of the season.

“That last possession, we forced [Higgins] into a tough shot, he missed it and I think we tapped it out of bounds and they got to have another opportunity,” Cree said. “Earlier in that possession, there was another rebound that we didn’t get. Closing the game off with a defensive rebound is kind of the lesson for us.”

Mercer Island appeared ready to turn around from the previous night’s 62-47 loss to Bellarmine, claiming an early 6-0 lead off back-to-back 3-point shots from Josh Stenberg. But the Knights got seven first-quarter points from Ryan Kingma to pull ahead 15-11 after one. In the second, Higgins scored 13 of his 15 first-half points as the Knights extended their advantage, taking a 33-24 lead into the break.

Mercer Island upped its defensive pressure in the second half, closing in on Higgins while getting seven third-quarter points from Stenberg and cutting the deficit to four. The fourth quarter saw Mercer Island claim its first lead since the game’s opening minutes, with a basket from Andrew Pickles giving the Islanders a 46-45 lead with just over five minutes to go. After several lead changes, a reverse layup from David Emanuels gave the Islanders a 54-53 lead with 54 seconds remaining. But Mercer Island couldn’t close out Newport on their final possession, sending Higgins to the line for the game’s winning points.

Higgins led all scorers with 23 points. Stenberg had 16 to lead the Islanders, while Pickles contributed 15.

Cree said after the game he wanted to see the Islanders improve their offensive execution, particularly working more possessions into the post. Despite seeing center Andrew Pickles reach double figures in scoring against Newport, Cree didn’t think the Mercer Island big man was getting enough touches down low.

“We did a better job in the second half getting it to [Pickles], but we took some early 3-point shots in possessions during the first half that, to me, were just throwaway possessions,” he said.

With a young team two games into a young season, Cree expects the Islanders will find their offensive groove once individual roles become more defined in regular rotation.

“We have a lot of guys that can play but we’re not quite sure who we have to settle on yet,” Cree said. “We’re going to spend the first month figuring that out, it’s such a new group. We’re counting on some young guys to score for us, so we have to bring them along and see which guys can score and play on the defensive end. We got to be a great defensive team, but we got to be able to put the ball in the basket too, so we’re trying to find those two-way players on our team.”