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Meadow Heights boys’ hot start enough, pushes past Greenville in WIT semis
Meadow Heights wasted no time jumping ahead of Greenville in the Woodland Invitational Tournament semifinals, and even though the Bears made it tight, the Panthers started the competition on the right foot in a 62-58 win.
Getting a bye through the first round, the Panthers ran into an outstanding Greenville program in the first game of the competition, but a hot start made all the difference as a Bears rally in the second half fell short.
Sending the Panthers through to the final, they await either No. 1 Woodland or No. 4 Leopold in the championship round with hopes of taking the gold for themselves.
That match will take place at 8 p.m. on Friday night in Marble Hill. With hopes of upending the hosting Cardinals’ back-to-back championships with a crown of their own in their first season under coach Gary Poyner, the Panthers are coming in hot.
Meadow Heights’ Braeden Hays led the Panthers with 18 points in the victory, 10 of which came in the first quarter as the Panthers jumped out to a big early lead.
Cooper Sturgeon led the Bears with 23 points in the loss, while sophomore Eli Evans added 14 and Jimmy Marler added another 11 points to round out the double-digit scoring.
Now 1-1 on the season, righting the ship from a loss to Scott City in the season opener, Meadow Heights gets back to the .500 point with an important WIT semifinal victory in which it looked every bit of the second seed.
Greenville, in its fourth game of the season, slips to the 2-2 mark after opening its tournament up with a victory over Perryville on Monday night, nearly making it back-to-back with a rally to nearly take the lead in the fourth.
Coming all the way back from down north of double digits at halftime, Greenville’s deficit sat at just 1 point in a 55-54 hole but eventually dropped the match by 4 points, but with no lack of spirit down the stretch with a championship berth on the line.
Led by a big opening quarter from Hays, the Panthers’ 7-2 run to end the first helped them to build a 10-point lead in a 17-7 edge after one quarter.
That lead only increased in the second as a buzzer-beating bucket from Case Seabaugh dropped in for the Panthers to give them a 34-21 halftime lead, putting the Bears all the way back on their heels for the start of the second half.
Meadow Heights held a 10-point edge going into the final possession of the third, but Cooper Sturgeon’s and-1 finish at the buzzer with the conversion cut the lead to just 49-42 going into the final frame as Greenville looked to chop away at the deficit.
Cutting that deficit all the way down to 55-54 inside the final two minutes, Greenville got right where it wanted, but it just couldn’t take the lead back from a fiery Meadow Heights squad.
Getting a big bucket from Mason Mayfield to get the lead back to 4 points, the Panthers narrowly pulled ahead and hit their all-important free throws to put the victorious bow on a 62-58 final and a spot in the WIT final at 8 p.m. on Friday night.