It Took Extra Minutes, But Ranger Bested South Plains
In the third quarterfinal, we had another overtime. #13 seed Ranger College faced off against Region 5 rival South Plains College for the right to advance to the simifinals, and a get together with Cowley College (KS). In today’s first quarterfinal, Cowley knocked undefeated and No. 1 seed Mineral Area College, from the unbeaten ranks, and from the tournament.
Ranger and South Plains usually have regular season contests, but covid concerns canceled several of the Region games this year for both teams.
South Plains took the lead on the first shot on a short jumper in the paint by Myron Gardner, one of the main point producers for the Texans. During their two game losing streak entering the tournament, Gardner was injured and did not play.
SPC extended their lead to its first half peak of 8 with under 4 minutes to play, but five of those points were covered before the end of the first period. South Plains went to the locker room ahead 42-39.
In the second period, the Rangers were able to tip the scales in their favor, and the lead flip-flopped much of the remainder of the game. In all the their were 11 ties (9 in the 2nd stanza) and nine lead exchanges, seven of those after the break.
The largest lead for either team was 8, Rangers’ coming 5 minutes into the 2nd.
With under two to play, and the SPC up 1, 71-70 after a Tiras Morton made FG, Ranger’s Peyton Rogers-Schmidt made back to back FTs to put his team on top. Twelve seconds later Rivaldo Soars hit a deep three from the right corner and the lead flipped again.
A Mark Mayle FG at the :32 mark tied the game at 74, and no further scoring took place, sending it two overtime, the third extra period game in the tourney, and 2nd in a row.
In the bonus five minutes, the Rangers scored first and scored last to earn the ticket to the semis. Final score was 87-83.
With the win, Ranger moves to 22-4, and gets to play Cowley College (KS), Friday, April 23 at 5:00.
Propelling the Rangers three in double figures, Keisei Tominaga found the net for 25. He was followed by Jorell Saterfiled’s 19, and Nika Metskhavarishvili with 17 and team high 8 rebounds.
Ranger head coach Larry Brown, in his second stint with the Rangers (he was head coach in 2011-13), he reflected on his team’s performance, “We told our kid that we were going to be in a battle, and we were going to have to play hard for 40 minutes, but I lied to them, it ended up being 45.
Brown added, “We felt like going in that rebounding was going to be big, they are one of the best rebounding teams in the country. And the rebounding ended up 40-40, so we matched them on that. That was the key I felt.”
With the loss, South Plains record falls to 18-3. Rivaldo Soars posted a doub-doub, tying game high with 25 points, and a game high 10 rebounds. The only other player surpass the 10 point barrier was Philmon Gerewhit who ended the night with 17.
