By Marissa VanWingen
Ninth-ranked Ellsworth Community College was playing for their second Region XI title in three years and had the win snatched from their grasps on Tuesday night.
Two key turnovers resulted in Iowa Central Community College (25-6) possessions. While the No. 11 Tritons did not convert those mishaps into points, they were able to preserve an 87-86 victory.
The Panthers (25-7) will now have to see how the rest of the conference tournaments shake out across the country to find out if they can make the NJCAA National Tournament as an at-large selection.
The Tritons took the first lead of the game before a Jayden Pretty three-ball gave the Panthers their first advantage of the opening 20 minutes (10-8). That jumpstarted a run for the visitors as they scored 11 unanswered and led 18-8 with 12 and a half minutes left to go in the half. The lead continued to swell and Pretty was hot from deep, making back-to-back threes for the 24-12 advantage. Pretty was five of six from downtown the first half and hit another triple to extend the lead to 35-19.
It looked to be a runaway lead for the visitors in the opening half as they shot lights out from deep, making nine of 15 while Iowa Central was just two of 10 from beyond the arc. The Tritons then closed the gap and went on a 12-0 run to cut the deficit to just two. Eesher Singh Sarai made a basket and a free throw as the Panthers went into the half with the 42-37 lead, but the Tritons looked to have shifted the momentum.
ECC came out of the break and led until four and a half minutes into the half when Iowa Central evened the score at 52-all. Then the two went back and forth with 11 lead changes and no advantage was safe. The Tritons went on top 68-63 on a pair of freebies before the visitors responded and cut the difference to two on a three ball by Jonovan Wilkinson (70-68).
Iowa Central remained out front until a triple from Tanner Berggren and a Collins Ngondu long ball gave ECC the 80-79 advantage. The Panthers hit 14 triples in the contest. The lead was short lived as the hosts responded and went back on top. The final ECC advantage was 86-85 on a Pretty basket after a turnover. The Tritons went back down the floor to score did not trail the rest of the game.
With 9.2 seconds left on the clock, the Panthers turned the ball over and then needed to foul. The Tritons missed both free throws and ECC nabbed the rebound. Jordan Cain stole the ball and the Panthers fouled again. Iowa Central was 11 of 22 from the charity stripe in the game and did not connect on either freebie. The visitors grabbed the rebound with just over a second left on the clock, enough time to heave a nearly full court shot. The attempt fell short and time ran out.
Pretty led all scoring with 21 points and was named to the all-tournament team, as was Wilkinson (17 points). Singh Sarai finished with a double-double of 16 points and 12 rebounds and Berggren chipped in 18.
Iowa Central will play on Saturday in the North Central B District Championship game and the Panthers play the waiting game to see if they receive an at-large bid to the NJCAA National Tournament.
"As of right now, we are in. All the teams that are ahead of us need to win their conference tournament, we're the next best team," Panther head coach Bryan Bender said. "I think we've done enough. At 25-7, at one point ranked number one in the country, we have four ranked wins and we have no bad losses. Every single one of our losses comes to a top 25 team."
Region XI-B Championship
Tuesday at Fort Dodge
ECC: 42| 44 – 86
ICCC: 37| 50 – 87
ECC Scoring: Jayden Pretty 7 2-2 21; Tanner Berggren 7 0-0 18; Jonovan Wilkinson 8 0-0 17; Eesher Singh Sarai 5 6-8 16; Will Taylor 3 0-0 8; Collins Ngondu 2 0-0 6.