Saints Fall In Final Seconds to Garden City

LIBERAL, Kan. – The Seward County men had a three in the final seconds to tie the game but it was off and Garden City escaped with a 77-76 win at The Greenhouse Wednesday night.

Seward (16-9, 11-8 KJCCC) has lost two games in a row while Garden City (16-8, 11-7) has won four straight to move into a three-way tie for fourth place.

The Saints forced 18 Garden City turnovers and outscored the Busters 48-28 in the paint, but Garden shot 9-22 from deep compared to Seward's 2-12. The Saints were just 20-35 (57.1%) from the free-throw line. Garden City shot 20-32 (62.5%).

The game saw seven ties and six lead changes. Garden City jumped out to a 13-2 lead in the first half but Seward clawed back and trailed just 36-32 at half outscoring Garden 30-23 over the final 15:36 of the half.

Seward outscored Garden 44-41 in the second half, using 13 second half points from Lucas N'Gombo. The Saints were 14-27 from the field in the half while holding Garden City to just 3-10 from three.

An N'Gombo layup at the 3:56 mark gave Seward a five-point advantage, 69-64, but a few minutes later, Garden tied it 71-71 off a three-point play from Mangok Gach. Brooks Powers put Seward ahead two with a pair of free throws but a three from the Buster's Dasean Lewis put them ahead 74-73 with 47 seconds to go. Lewis iced the game with three free throws down the stretch.

With Seward down 77-74 with seven seconds to play, Garden City turned the ball over on a five second call on the inbounds. The Saints had a chance to tie it as Quincey Kidd had an open look at a three, but he just missed it. N'Gombo got the rebound and put a layup in but it was too late.

Lewis led all scorers with 23 for GCCC shooting 6-9 from three.

N'Gombo turned in 15 points and six rebounds. RJ McKinnie added 13 points and five rebounds, Antonio Williams Jr. posted 13 points and JJ Chapman had 11 points off the bench.

The Saints travel to No. 17 Butler on Saturday for a 4 p.m. tipoff in El Dorado.