Augusta senior forward Zach Davidson (35) and Seabury senior forward Luke Hornberger jump for the opening tip. Augusta defeated Seabury 60-47 on Friday, Jan. 24.

Baldwin City — While revenge may have been on the mind of Bishop Seabury, a comeback win wasn’t in the cards for the Seahawks.

After grabbing an early lead, Seabury (7-1) fell 60-47 to Augusta (9-2) in the semifinals of the Baldwin Invitational Tournament Friday.

“I don’t think the score is quite indicative of the effort that we put out there on the court,” Seabury coach Jonathan Raney said. “It wasn’t for lack of wanting. I just thought that they kind out-physicaled us in a couple areas at times. But I was proud of the fight and the effort that we brought.”

Last time these two teams met, the Seahawks fell to the Orioles 70-40 in a mostly one-sided game. But now with Seabury ranked No. 1 in Class 2A and winning five games this season by at least 40 points, the Seahawks were seemingly building momentum to turn things around this season.

“We have a lot of guys in that locker room that remember last year,” Raney said. “Obviously it left a bitter taste in their mouth and you can tell by the way we came out (tonight). But it definitely meant something to them out on that floor.”

And they couldn’t have asked for a better start as a pull-up jumper from junior guard Zach Bloch and a layup from sophomore forward Joao Carlos Ramirez put the Seahawks up 4-0 early.

However, it was all Augusta as the Orioles outscored the Seahawks 18-7 for the rest of the first quarter, to take a 18-11 lead.

A problem for Seabury was the lack of a second option offensively in the first half, with Ramirez scored 13 of the Seahawks’ first 15 points. And after that early jumper from Bloch, the next player — outside or Ramirez — to score was senior guard Cobe Green who hit a 3-pointer with just over two minutes left in the first half.

“There was a feeling out process and we let them get too comfortable of a lead against us,” Raney said. “Every time you play against a team like that and play catch up it’s going to be a long time.”

While it wasn’t insurmountable, Seabury still had plenty of work to do trailing 34-22 at halftime.

The third quarter was mostly game management and clawing away at that lead. Late in the quarter Ramirez picked up his fourth foul, but the Seahawks still managed to cut the lead to 44-35 going into the fourth quarter.

Seabury saved the best for last, as that fourth quarter was when the Seahawks looked the sharpest. But as Seabury cut the lead to 50-45 after a pair of free throws from Green, more problems came up as Ramirez fouled out. Ramirez finished with 17 points.

Even with Ramirez out, Raney was proud of the effort and fight shone by his entire team, especially senior forward Luke Hornberger inside and the defense of Green.

“That’s who these kids are,” Raney said. “They’re tough kids. They’ve been through a lot of tough games. Everybody gave everything they had.”

However, there was still five minutes left to play and Seabury was now within striking distance. Even then, though, Augusta could afford a few mistakes — namely turnovers — and had enough time to wake back up offensively.

The Orioles stretched the lead back out to 57-47 with under a minute to play and hit enough free throws to ice the game. Augusta was 19-25 from the free throw line.

Despite the loss, Raney believes this will be a great learning experience given Seabury’s margin of victory this season.

“These are obviously (more) realistic of postseason games and where we hope to be at the end of the season,” Raney said. “Heck, I don’t know if we’re going to play a team as good as Augusta the rest of the season. This should be good experience for our group.”

And Seabury can’t let this linger for long as the Seahawks will play in the third place game on Saturday. Raney is hoping for a positive finish to the weekend and that his team can shake this loss off quickly.

“We’re disappointed, but we’re going to do our best to bounce back and leave here 2-1,” Raney said, “and feeling a little bit better about ourselves than we do now. It’ll be another test for us and I expect us to be up to the challenge.”

Seabury will next play in the third place game of the Baldwin Invitational Tournament Saturday against either JC Harmon or Louisburg. Tipoff is at 4 p.m.

Seabury (47)

Joao Carlos Ramirez 7-22 2-2 17, Zach Bloch 4-14 1-2 9, Luke Hornberger 3-7 2-3 8, Cobe Green 2-5 2-2 7, Stavian Jones 3-8 0-1 6, Sam Bayliss 0-2 0-2 0. Totals 19-58 7-12 47.

Augusta (60)

Jaren Jackson 6-13 9-10 22, Ely Wilcox 5-7 5-10 16, Zach Davidson 4-9 3-3 11, Ryan Andrews 1-3 2-2 5, Brendan Parker 2-9 0-0 4, Xander Roberts 1-3 0-0 2. Totals 19-44 19-25 60.

Seabury 11 11 13 12 — 47

Augusta 18 16 10 16 — 60

3-point field goals: Seabury 2-15 (Green, Ramirez); Augusta 3-9 (Andrews, Jackson, Wilcox). Turnovers: Seabury 7, Augusta 15.