RALEIGH — Sanderson never trailed Tuesday, withstanding an early second-half Heritage surge to walk away with a 68-53 win.

The Spartans rebounded from an overtime loss to Wakefield in its Friday conference opener to move to .500 in Cap Eight play with the win over the Huskies.

“We’re a very resilient team,” said Sanderson coach Mike Shaw. “I knew they would come back hard. It wasn’t pretty. It came down to it being a fight in the end, and we hit our free throws.”

Sanderson led 33-21 at the half, but Heritage quickly cut its deficit to four points with an 8-0 run to open the third quarter.

The Spartans’ slow second half start is something Shaw has seen from his team nearly every game this season, but a 3-pointer from senior Reggie Traywick got Sanderson (4-4, 1-1) going to hold off the visiting Huskies. Traywick led all scorers with 19 points.

Traywick has been a big weapon for the Spartans as the team has struggled with injuries to key players.

The Spartans welcomed back starter Parker Fennema (10 points) last week, but are still without starter Will Judy, who is out with a concussion.

“We’ve only played two games with out whole team, and those were our best two games,” Shaw said.

Still, Sanderson was able to use an 11-3 run in the first 2:30 of the fourth quarter to distance itself as Heritage (4-4, 0-2) struggled to convert from the field.

The Huskies followed made baskets with a full-court press, but often ended up fouling Sanderson players, who made their free throws count down the stretch.

The Spartans spent the final six minutes of the game in the double bonus and Joel Rosen went 10 for 10 from the line in the fourth quarter to finish with 16 points for Sanderson.

Heritage coach Pat Kennedy said his team, which shot 4 of 24 from 3-point range, needs to find more consistency.

“We have too many highs and lows,” Kennedy said. “There’s some good play at times, but I’m not sure their chemistry is there. We’ve got good guys and they like each other, but that on-court chemistry may take a while. ... I thought we did a good job cutting the lead to four, but we have to do a better job of not digging holes.”

Heritage was led by Mike Dix with 13 points and Jared Joyner with 12.

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