Isaac Muze makes it a point to not lament, even if he doesn’t score a point.

So after Huntley’s resilient sophomore guard picked up two fouls in the first four minutes of Friday night’s Fox Valley Conference game against visiting Hampshire, he never dropped his head, never let his mind drift.

Which was a good thing for the Red Raiders, because they needed him in the fourth quarter of a tight game.

“Even though you don’t do well one game, you always have to move on to the next,” Muze said. “Play by play, game by game, you have to move on. You can’t be stuck on what you did.”

One week after Cary-Grove held him scoreless for the first time in his rookie season on varsity, Muze had a team-high 13 points, including seven in the fourth, as Huntley rallied from 10 down in the second half to outlast Hampshire 43-40.

“It was nice to see him get his confidence back,” Raiders coach Collin Kalamatas said.

Huntley (3-6, 3-2) needed a victory after losing three in a row. The Raiders started strong, building a 16-8 lead a minute into the second quarter when Isaiah Onu (six points, five rebounds) muscled in a shot in the lane, but they then went ice cold. Huntley finished the quarter making only one of 13 shots and trailed 19-16 at half.

Guard Jordan Parish helped get Hampshire (1-9, 0-5) the lead, hitting his first three shots from beyond the arc, including one that he banked in from the top of the key. His first two 3s came off passes from Cole Harkin.

“What got us that lead was playing well as a team, playing team ball, and then we just got away from that,” Whip-Purs coach Mike Featherly said.

Parish kept up his hot shooting from outside in the third, hitting two more 3s. But after his fifth, which put Hampshire up 31-22 with 3:41 left, he drew a technical foul for taunting and went to the bench. When he returned to the game, Huntley, had cut its deficit to 33-29.

Sean Roth’s post-up move had put Hampshire up 33-23 with 2:50 left in the third.

It was Hampshire’s technical foul, as the Whip-Purs got one during warmups because a player dunked. Aidan Gibbs’ two free throws had the Raiders leading 2-0 before the game even started.

“We got to do the little things better,” Featherly said.

Muze sparked Huntley’s offense in the fourth, hitting a 13-footer and then a layup in transition after Tyler Dudzinski’s steal. Muze’s 3-pointer from the top of the key broke a 40-all tie with 2:29 left, and neither team scored again.

Parish, meanwhile, didn’t score again after his fifth 3. He finished with a game-high 15 points, attempting only one shot, a 3-pointer, in the fourth.

“We ended up changing our defensive scheme after he got his fifth 3,” Kalamatas said. “We ended up not letting him catch, face-guarded him a little bit. We took him out of rhythm and took their offense out of rhythm.”

With both teams turning the ball over repeatedly down the stretch, Hampshire had a chance to tie multiple times in the final seconds but missed two three-point shots.

After a timeout, Tyler Lacke missed from several feet beyond the top of the key. Then after the Whips maintained possession and burned their final timeout with five seconds left, they set a double-screen for Lacke, whose running 3 from the corner was off the mark.

“It’s got to be a microcosm of our season,” Featherly said of his team’s lack of execution down the stretch. “We play well in stretches, and then just have bad decision-making at the end.”

Trey Simmons had nine points and six rebounds for Hampshire, while Roth added eight points.

Gibbs finished with seven points for Huntley. Kaczmarski and Onu had six each, and sophomore Seun Oladipo scored seven, including a 3, off the bench.

“It’s good to win, always, but I feel like our effort, even in our losses, there has been progress,” Muze said. “Even if you lose games, if we play our best effort game, it’s still a win.”

Huntley will take all wins. Gibbs and Kaczmarski are the only Raiders who played varsity minutes last season.

“We’re battling,” Kalamatas said. “You got a group of guys that doesn’t have a ton of varsity experience. There’s a lot of growth happening here in the early part of the season.”