There’s a fine line between winning and losing, as the Richmond Hill’s boys’ basketball team is learning this season.

Hopefully some hard-earned lessons will pay dividends as the Wildcats head down the home stretch looking for their first trip to the state playoffs in five years.

Richmond Hill picked up a pair of wins last week including a hard-fought 55-47 win over Johnson last Saturday that Coach Bill Henderson hopes will give his team the shot in the arm it needed to finish the regular season on a strong note.

While Henderson was pleased with the way his team, playing without leading scorer Josh Mock,  held the Atomsmashers at bay the downside was the previous night the Wildcats (10-10, 1-5) dropped a 61-55 Region 1-6A dogfight to Valdosta at Wildcats Arena.

Of the Wildcats’ region losses all have come by eight or fewer points. The lone win was a 66-60 win over Camden County in what was perhaps their most complete game of the season, certainly in region play.

Richmond Hill will be on the road this week for a pair of region games. It was at Camden on Tuesday night and will be at Colquitt County on Friday. The Wildcats dropped a 44-42 decision to the Packers three weeks ago.

While Johnson isn’t the world beater it’s been the last several seasons the Atomsmashers are still a formidable opponent. In Henderson’s eyes it was a good win that hopefully will generate some much-needed momentum with three of the Wildcats’ final four region games on the road.

“It feels great,” Henderson said of seeing his team win a close game after several near misses. “Obviously we would [have] liked to have won by a lot more but it’s nice to win one like this.

“I told the guys we’re going to face adversity and it’s nice to see them get over that hump,” Henderson said. “We have been so close so many times. I thought the execution was there. We rebounded well late, made a couple of free throws when we had to, executed when we had to.

“It was a great team win and hopefully it will get us moving in the right direction for this last region stretch.”

It looked as if Richmond Hill was going to coast home as it built a 25-10 lead midway through the second quarter. But as has been their wont this season the Wildcats let the Atomsmasher go on a half ending 16-2 run to make it a 27-26 game at the break.

Alonzo Miller made a free throw to start the third quarter and after Johnson tied it at 28-28 Drew Nudo got a putback after a Miller miss. Miller then got a fast break layup and took an excellent pass from Nudo for a bucket that made it 34-28.

Richmond Hill was up by four, 38-34, going into the final eight minutes and opened the fourth quarter on an 8-2 run with Nudo scoring six for a 10-point advantage.

Although that proved to be too much for the Atomsmashers to overcome they did give the Wildcats a final scare when they trimmed the deficit to two, 46-44, with two minutes remaining.

Sebastian Dorelien then hit a pair of free throws and Marki Boone took a long pass from Brandon French on a breakaway against the Johnson press for an easy layup and the Wildcats held on from there to close out the win.

“They cut into the lead and our guys responded,” Henderson said. “We’ve got to do a better job of controlling stops so that doesn’t happen. We turned it over a couple of times and gave the lead away.

“We could have collapsed. Instead, we responded the right way. We got some stops on defense and ran some good sets on offense. That’s what we’re looking to do moving forward.”

Nudo, who had 25 points in a 68-46 win over Southeast Bulloch on Tuesday night, scored 16 to lead the Wildcats. Miller scored 11 and Boone added 10.

The night before the loss to Valdosta was a microcosm of the Wildcats season as they jumped out to a 17-9 first quarter lead but could not maintain that momentum. Valdosta outscored the homestanding Wildcats 36-23 in the middle two quarters.

Mock scored 16 against Valdosta and Miller had 15 while Boone added 10.

Mock “tweaked a toe” against Valdosta per Henderson who said he chose to sit Mock out in the non-region game against Johnson rather than risk further injury with two region games this week.