St. Bede freshman guard Hannah Heiberger didn’t think too much about the situation.

With the Bruins pushing the ball up the court off a rebound with time winding down, Heiberger pulled up for a 3-pointer. She sank the shot with 4.8 seconds left to lift St. Bede to a 40-37 victory over Midland in a Tri-County Conference game Thursday in Peru.

“If I thought too much about it, I don’t know if it would have gone in,” Heiberger said. “Having the opportunity to take it, I just had to take a deep breath. I was shaking, but when I shot it and it went in, I was just happy that I could do that for my team.”

After the Timberwolves missed a pair of shots, St. Bede coach Tom Ptak let his team go for the win without taking a timeout to set something up.

“I didn’t call a timeout because we were in transition,” Ptak said. “I want them to go after the shots they are comfortable with. The clock was running so let’s take what we get.

“I was very impressed with Hannah. She had ice in her veins to shoot a 3 in that situation. A lot of freshmen would be passing it to a senior, but she’s not shy. We’re fortunate to have her.”

The Bruins scored six points in the final minute to pull out the win.

Midland went ahead 37-34 on two free throws by Emma Franks.

But on the other end of the court, St. Bede senior Lili McClain made a 3 from way downtown to tie it.

“I think Lili should shoot more of those like Caitlin Clark,” Ptak said. “She has the green light to do that. We’re trying to instill in her confidence to do that.”

The teams scored just seven combined points in the third quarter and the Bruins led 24-22 going to the final eight minutes before both offenses got going.

St. Bede pushed its lead to 29-24 on a 3 by Heiberger and a bucket by Savannah Bray before Midland rallied with a basket by Anna McGlasson and a 3 from Ella Foster.

McClain and McGlasson traded three-point plays before the Timberwolves hit 5-of-6 free throws in the final two minutes to lead until the Bruins’ late heroics.

“We just picked each other up and hustled as much as we could,” Heiberger said about St. Bede’s rally. “We had each other’s backs no matter what.”

Midland looked on the verge of taking control in the second quarter with an 11-3 run to build a 20-12 lead before the Bruins made adjustments and closed the half on a 7-0 run to go into break down 20-19.

“We switched up what we were doing a little bit to have more spacing on the court to get movement,” Heiberger said.

In the third quarter, the Bruins limited Midland to just a bucket by McGlasson with 7:19 left before holding the Timberwolves scoreless the rest of the period.

“We’ve been focusing on playing hard-nosed man,” Ptak said. “We thought we could match up with them. Obviously, (McGlasson) is a good player with her height. We were going to try to front her to try to limit her looks. Hannah Heiberger guarding the point was key. She had some big steals and just made them uncomfortable.”

With the win, the Bruins are 4-3 - winning their last four games - and are 2-0 in conference play.

“We set the goal that we wanted to be 2-0 in the conference at the end of this week,” Ptak said. “It’s a tough conference. It gives us confidence that we can compete in this conference. This year, they changed it and we only play each other once, so now it’s a different ball game. You can’t go back and get revenge.”

Heiberger and McClain scored 13 points for St. Bede, while Bray added eight points. McGlasson led the Timberwolves (6-2, 1-1) with a game-high 16 points, while Foster and Jordyn Pyles each hit a pair of 3s.