Word.ws English Dictionary

buzzer-beater

buzzer-beater noun: a shot that wins (or in some usage, ties) a game at the last possible moment.

Noun

buzzer-beater (plural buzzer-beaters)

  1. (idiomatic) A shot that wins (or in some usage, ties) a game at the last possible moment.
    • The Knicks immediately went 7-0 upon Lin's insertion in the lineup. He dropped 38 against the Lakers and beat Toronto with a buzzer-beater.2013, Pete Birle, On the Hardwood: New York Knicks, MVP Books, →ISBN, page 40

Forms of buzzer-beater

pluralbuzzer-beaters
alternative formbuzzer beater

Origin of buzzer-beater

In the sense of beating out the buzzer which ends a game.

Questions about buzzer-beater

What does buzzer-beater mean?
Buzzer-beater means a shot that wins (or in some usage, ties) a game at the last possible moment.
What part of speech is buzzer-beater?
Buzzer-beater is a noun.
What is the plural of buzzer-beater?
The plural of buzzer-beater is buzzer-beaters.

Words near buzzer-beater in the dictionary

  1. buzzer beaters
  2. buzzer flag
  3. buzzer flags
  4. buzzer phone
  5. buzzer phones
  6. buzzer-beater
  7. buzzer-beaters
  8. buzzerphone
  9. buzzerphones
  10. buzzers
  11. buzzes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: buzzer-beater (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “buzzer-beater.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/buzzer-beater. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.