North Bend Central lost 45-44 to St. Paul in the boys C1-4 district basketball championship at Cross County High School Tuesday night, in a game aired on 107.9 The Bull.
St. Paul raced out to a 14-0 lead, and led 19-5 after the first quarter.
NBC recovered by scoring 16 points in the second quarter, and was able to cut the score to 29-21 at halftime.
The Tigers had a solid third quarter as well, scoring 12 points, and after three quarters, NBC trailed just 37-34.
The Tigers came back to tie the game at 42-42, before St. Paul converted a three point play to go up 45-42 with less than 30 seconds left.
Austin Endorf scored a late bucket to make it 45-44.
NBC was forced to foul in order to stop the clock, but the Tigers caught a break when St. Paul missed consecutive free throws, giving NBC the opportunity for a winning shot.
The Tigers had to go the full length of the court with just over four seconds to play. St. Paul came out in full court pressure defensively.
NBC was able to get down the floor in a time, but the winning shot missed from the right corner, preserving the win for St. Paul. The Wildcats were able to avenge a 72-55 loss the NBC from earlier in the season.
Jaxon Wietfeld had 16 points for NBC, with Endorf adding 9 and Brodey Johnson scoring 8.
The Tigers end their season at 23-3 overall.
Really tough break for North Bend Central. The Tigers were on schedule to make another State run up until their last two games of the season.
NBC hit a rut against both Aquinas and St. Paul, and lost for whatever reason.
To call this loss shocking isn't even doing it justice.
I'm flabbergasted that the Tigers lost this game.
I figured North Bend Central was a sure lock for State.
I'm sure the Tigers feel they should still be playing right now.
It is what it is though, and all NBC can do is get ready for next season.
It's tough....you put all this time and effort in to make another State run and have an amazing regular season and first game of Sub-Districts, and then bam the season is over just like that.
Cody Prohaska, Cody Pospisil, Endorf, and Cole Johnson are all lost to graduation.
These four seniors have to be devastated that the team didn't qualify for State in their senior season.
Key returners for next year include Breckin Peters, Johnson, Wietfeld, and Austin Taylor.
The Tigers should have a good chance to make another State run next year, but man this was a difficult end to the season this year.
It might take North Bend Central a bit to recover from this one.
At some point the Tigers have to pick themselves up and get back up on that horse though.
NBC has to work that much harder in the offseason to make sure what happened this year doesn't happen next year.
Easier said than done though as the Tigers had a golden opportunity to make another state run, and came up short.
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