GODFREY – The Alton Redbirds had not pulled off a Southwestern Conference boys basketball sweep of the East St. Louis Flyers since 2006.

The Redbirds snapped that string at nine seasons in a row on Tuesday night.

Maurice Edwards scored 26 points, including an exclamation-point dunk at the final buzzer, to lead Alton to a 79-74 victory over the Flyers at Alton High.

Alton, which had lost eight of its previous nine matchups with the Flyers before winning this season’s home-and-away, improves to 11-8 and 7-3 in the SWC. East Side is 9-12 and 5-5 in the league.

“We’ve got a good basketball team,” Alton coach Eric Smith said. “We really, truly do. We haven’t necessarily been as consistent as we’d like, but we’ve got a good basketball team. Our kids are resilient and they find a way.”

The Redbirds are alone in second place in the SWC, though Edwardsville – at 9-0 in the league – has drawn off from the pack. But for an Alton team that had lost six of nine games after a 7-2 start, the focus is mounting momentum for February’s stretch run over the conference race.

“We just need to play better,” said Smith, whose team was coming off a road win at Belleville East on Friday. “We started out the season like gangbusters. We hit a little bit of a lull. The win against East was a good win. This was a good win.”

In a high-possession game that saw neither the Flyers nor Redbirds willing to relent, 10 players scored in double figures.

Edwards had 17 of his game-high 26 points in the second half. Kevin Caldwell Jr. scored 15 points, Marcus Latham had 13, Paul Harris had 11 and Tre Smith had 10, including eight in the second half.

The Flyers led most of the game before Alton seized control in the fourth quarter. Edwards’ three-point play with 4:53 left drew Alton even at 64-64. East Side would not lead again.

The Redbirds led by as many as six points (74-68) and held off the Flyers despite making 4 of 10 free throws in the final two minutes. Alton erased a 13-point third-quarter deficit in its 65-62 win Dec. 4 in East St. Louis.

East Side was without head coach Phillip Gilbert, who missed Tuesday’s game for the birth of his child. Marquise Chairs scored 15 points to lead the Flyers, who got 13 each from Kenny Roberson and Patrick Baxter, 12 from Arthur Carter and 10 from Kerion Chairs.

The Flyers started quickly, with first-quarter leads of 8-2 and 17-11 before taking that six-point (19-13) lead to the second quarter. East Side led by as many as seven points (23-16) before Alton rallied with a 10-2 that included a 3-pointer from Caldwell, a basket from Edwards, a three-point play from Latham and a Smith bucket that put the Redbirds up 31-29 with 3:23 left in the first half.

The Flyers got back-to-back three-point plays from Carter and Baxter to up 39-33 before taking a 43-38 edge to halftim