MOULTRIE — The Colquitt County boys basketball team continued to make the end of 2008 better than the beginning, defeating St. Francis High of Alpharetta 63-57 in overtime on Monday in their opening game of the Colquitt County Roundball Classic at the Gladys Espy Gymnasium.

Both Colquitt County teams were forced into overtime, but the Lady Packers, who squandered a seven-point lead in the final 1:02 of overtime, failed to score in the extra period and fell to Dougherty 59-56.

In the other first-round girls games on Monday, Albany defeated Lee County 46-40, Stockbridge won over Monroe 43-28 and Westover defeated Savannah 44-34.

In the other boys games, Miller County routed Lee County 79-46, Mt. Zion-Jonesboro won over Baker County 60-34 and Monroe won over Stockbridge 65-56.

The Colquitt County boys had a chance to win in regulation when Eric Key’s second basket in eight seconds put the Packers up 53-52 with 10.8 seconds left.

But St. Francis’ Devonte Davis was fouled at the other end with 6.9 seconds remaining and hit the first of his two free throws and the game went into overtime.

St. Francis, which plays in Region 7-A, scored first in the overtime on a free throw by Brian Wood, the last of his 20 points.

Jalen Simmons added another free throw with 3 minutes left in overtime to put the Knights up by two at 55-53.

After Simmons missed a free throw 20 seconds later, Nate Hill rebounded and scored at the other end to tie the game.

St. Francis turned the ball over on its next two possessions and the Packers turned them into baskets by Dominique Hadley and Brian Berl to lead 59-55 with 1:30 left.

Sam Kim came up with a loose ball and put it in the basket with 54 seconds left to pull St. Francis back to with two points.

But Hill scored twice in the final 18 seconds, including a jam at the buzzer, to give the Packers the six-point lead.

The victory was the third in a row for Colquitt County, which had lost 19 in a row before beating Worth County and Statesboro in the U-Save-It Christmas Classic in Albany last week.

“Our character is getting better game by game,” Packers coach Kirven Davis said. “When things didn’t go our way, the kids didn’t quit.

“We got a lot of fan support and we tried to build off the emotion of the girls game.”