Staff photo / Preston Byers. Canfield’s Jake DeLisio tries to finish a runner during the Cardinals’ loss to Warren G. Harding on Friday in Canfield.

CANFIELD — Two of the best boys basketball teams in the state collided Friday.

Despite a raucous crowd cheering against them and their best player dealing with foul trouble, the Warren G. Harding Raiders emerged victorious over Canfield, which suffered just its second loss of the season.

The Raiders battled through key moments without star forward Chaz Coleman, who picked up his fourth foul early in the final period, and flipped Friday’s game on its head with a 14-1 run that enabled Harding to exit Canfield with a 54-49 win over its All-American Conference rival.

“It was everything that I thought it was going to be — a tough, tough game, high level, two really good state-ranked teams. That’s all you can ask for,” Harding coach Keelyn Franklin said.

Harding fell behind early and entered the second quarter down 16-11. The second proved to be a battle of threes, though, of which the Raiders took advantage.

Harding opened the second quarter on a 9-0 run, courtesy of three triples, to take the lead back from Canfield. The Cardinals, despite surrendering four threes in the quarter and initially struggling to adjust to the Raiders’ rangy zone defense, tied the game at 25 apiece with a Bryce Roberts 3-pointer shortly before halftime.

In the third quarter, Canfield built a seven-point lead through the first four minutes. But Harding, like it had done in the first half, battled back.

After a Davion Herron triple and Coleman splitting a pair of free throws, an official whistled Canfield for a foul on another Herron 3-point attempt with 4.8 seconds remaining in the quarter. The foul call drew a strong reaction from the home fans, as well as Canfield head coach Andy Vlajkovich, who angrily watched Herron make each of the free throws to send the game to the fourth tied 36-36.

The Cardinals made the first basket of the fourth quarter — a Landon Shina 3-pointer — but most of the rest of the period would belong to Harding.

Following Shina’s triple, the Raiders prevented Canfield from making another field goal for more than five minutes. During that time, Harding went on a game-winning 14-1 run, which led the large contingent of Cardinals fans to quiet down and the outnumbered Raiders fans to make their voices heard.

Herron, in particular, clapped his hands and yelled as the Harding supporters became the loudest in the gymnasium.

“Our crowd definitely juices us up, pumps us up, and that’s a lot of energy coming from the bench and the crowd, so we used that to fight back in the game,” Herron said.

Franklin also praised the atmosphere from both teams’ fans and indicated hope it could be a sign of a new — and old — normal.

“We traveled extremely well today, and I think that obviously, as you can see with the fans cheering, it gave us some energy when we needed it,” Franklin said. “So thank you to our fans for coming out and traveling and packing our side of the gym. Canfield came out. I mean, you can’t ask for a better atmosphere for a high school basketball game.

“…This is what it used to be like when I played back in ’07. Fans used to travel, and we always knew that our fans would have our back no matter where we went. And it felt like that [tonight]. I think we’re getting back to that, being not only a premier program in the area, but also in the state. I think we got all the pieces that we need, and guys just got to stay confident yet humble and continue to work. I think the sky’s the limit for this group.”

For Canfield, Vlajkovich said a key factor in Friday’s loss was that the Raiders made shots when they needed to, and the Cardinals did not.

“I think down the stretch, they made some shots that we didn’t… The length of their zone affected us a little bit. I thought we actually ran some really good zone offense. We really had some good things. The problem is we couldn’t score it,” Vlajkovich said.

Roberts finished the night with a game-high 19 points, while Drew Shapiro, the only other Cardinal in double figures, added 10. For Harding, three players scored more than 10 points: Coleman (18), Herron (11) and Jeremy Sampson (14).

Canfield (13-2, 3-1 in AAC), which had won seven in a row entering Friday, will attempt to start another win streak Sunday vs. Green.

Harding (12-2, 4-0) can extend its win streak to eight with a victory at Austintown Fitch on Tuesday.