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The shortest distance between two points is a straight line.

On Friday evening, the Middletown High boys basketball team discovered the quickest path to victory starts at the foul line. Hitting 13-of-17 free throws, the host Knights held off a late Clarksburg run for 47-44 win in the opening round of the Class 2A West playoffs.

"It was tough," Middletown's Will Lyons said. "We had to work hard for it. We've never stopped believing the whole season. We kept fighting and it finally paid off."

Quality outweighed quantity for the Knights. Connecting on a meager 16 field goals, sixth-seeded Middletown did its damage from the line, especially late.

Lyons and his teammates watched as a nine-point (33-24) third quarter lead dwindled to 39-36 with approximately two minutes to go. Lining up for the Knights' first foul shots of the fourth quarter, Chris Pirrone padded the advantage by draining both attempts.

After Detric Hodge's 3-pointer, Clarksburg pulled within 45-42 on a Sam Collins' free throw. As the one-possession affair continued, Pirrone (eight points) was fouled with 10.6 seconds remaining. Once again the Knights' sophomore knocked down the pair. Hodge's hit a floater with 2.7 seconds remaining, but it wasn't enough.

Middletown (5-18) entered the game shooting a pedestrian 54 percent from the line. On Dec. 19, the Knights suffered a 47-45 loss at North Hagerstown, missing all six of their fourth quarter free throws. Determined not to suffer a similar fate, Middletown was a perfect 6 of 6 in the fourth Friday and 10 pf 12 after halftime.

"We've been shooting upwards of 30 or 40 foul shots during practice and I think that really helped us tonight," Middletown's Morgan Winn said.

Dropping a double-double, Lyons (14 points and 10 rebounds) paced the Knights. Jordan Hall had 13 points while Winn added eights points and eight rebounds.

The charity stripe was anything but kind to the Coyotes. Clarksburg was successful on only 8-of-15 foul shots.

"One of the big differences was foul shooting," Coyotes' head coach Cliff Elgin said. "Middletown did a great job knocking down foul shots. That's the difference right there. Give Middletown credit. They made foul shots and we didn't and that's why they walked away with the win."

Chris Viqueira led the Coyotes with 13. Sam Collins had eight for the No. 11 seeded Clarksburg (3-20).

"We were down nine in the second half," Elgin said." I told the kids that five weeks ago we might have just quit. They kind of dug down deep and did a real nice job battling back."

Middletown will visit third-seeded Liberty (12-9) on Monday.