Raiders upset No. 7 Triton, earn first NJCAA Tournament bid since 2012

For the first time in 13 years, the Three Rivers College men's basketball team is headed back to Hutch.

The Raiders upset the seventh-ranked Triton Trojans 84-72 Saturday night at the Libla Family Sports Complex to claim the NJCAA Midwest District Championship and a trip to the NJCAA Tournament in Hutchinson, Kansas.

Three Rivers (21-12) entered Saturday's contest as the Region XVI champions, while Triton (28-5), a Chicago-area school, won the Region IV championship and was the defending national runner-up.

The Raiders came out ready to play, and Triton didn’t seem to match Three Rivers’ intensity in the first half. The Raiders built an early lead based on an opportunistic defense that forced turnovers and a good balance of lane penetration and timely 3-pointers.

The defense never allowed the Trojans to put together a sustained run, and Three Rivers led by 16 points, 43-27, at halftime.

Triton tried to mount a comeback run in the second half, mainly with offensive pressure, and while it did cut into the Raiders lead on a couple of occasions, the Trojans defense had no answer for the Three Rivers; offense, which maintained a double-digit lead through most of the second half for the 12-point victory and the trip to Kansas.

“I got really high character guys, and they worked extremely hard,” said Raiders head coach Robert Kirby. “They came in July and worked out in July, and we didn’t stop doing two-a-days until two weeks ago, so our guys did a great job persevering through all the hardship and doing all the hard work.”

Three Rivers had five players score in double figures, led by Ethan Johnson's 17 points. Matt Hampton added 14 points, while Meechie White had 13 and the duo of Deuce Alexander and Johann Pautsch each finished with 11.

Triton's Vijay Wallace scored a game-high 19 points, while three teammates joined him in double figures — Tolu Samuels and Dajuan Anderson with 14 apiece and Peitok Machar with 13.

The Raiders started the game playing more disciplined than Triton, forcing turnovers and converting them into points for an 8-4 lead five minutes into the first half.

After Triton tied it at 8-8, Pautsch made two layups, Alexander hit a 3-pointer, and then Johnson added a steal-and-score to give Three Rivers a 17-8 lead with 12:14 to play in the half.

“They’re such an exceptionally good shooting team that they were going to make some threes,” Kirby said. “We couldn’t get into a 3-point shooting contest with them, and I was worried about that, especially after we made a couple of 3s because it’s easy to keep shooting the next one instead of attacking the paint.”

The Raiders gave up a two and a 3, but came back with two huge triples from Johnson to grow their lead to 25-13 halfway through the first. But by the next timeout at 7:52, the Trojans had cut the lead to 27-17.

However, over the next three-plus minutes, Three Rivers went on a 7-0 run to increase its lead to 34-17 before Triton scored two points at the four-minute mark.

The Raiders committed their seventh foul of the half at 2:29, putting Triton in the bonus and allowing them to cut the score to 38-21.

The rest of the half was delayed with fouls, mostly in favor of Three Rivers, and although their free throw percentage was roughly 50/50, the Raiders went into halftime with a 43-27 lead.

“We wanted to establish the aggressiveness from the last two games,” White said about their game plan. “We play very good defense, not falling in love with jump shots, get into the paint and getting easy shots early, getting them back on their heels so when we come out in the second half, we play in the same exact way that we’ve been playing for three days straight.”

Triton began to increase the pressure early in the second half with back-to-back 3-pointers to bring the Trojans within 12 points at 49-37 after the first five minutes of play.

The Trojans brought their deficit down to single digits at 11:45 with a layup to make it 53-44, but Alexander responded with a 15-foot jumper for Three Rivers to put the lead back up to 55-44.

After two free throws from White, Pautsch hit a layup and drew a foul. He missed the free throw, but the Raiders controlled the rebound and led 61-48 with 8:05 remaining.

Johnson nailed a 3-pointer to extend the Raiders’ lead to 66-50 with seven minutes remaining in the game. They made it 70-56 at 4:15, and then the teams traded 3s, and the Raiders possessed the ball at 3:30 with a 73-59 lead.

Triton called a timeout with 2:09 left to play with Three Rivers leading 76-64 and possession of the ball. Marial Malek was fouled on the inbounds and made one of two free throws. Now the Trojans had no choice but to foul with less than two minutes remaining.

White hit one of two free throws to make it 78-66. Triton missed its next shot and fouled Malek on the rebound, who made both free throws for an 80-66 lead with 1:40 left.

Triton kept its slim hopes alive with a 3-pointer to cut the Raiders’ lead to 81-70 with one minute remaining, but Hampton hit two more free throws to get the lead back to 13 points. Once the clock was under one minute, the outcome was no longer in doubt.

“The win feels good especially coming off last year when we came up short of our goal, so it’s a great feeling,” said Alexander, who also described their game plan: “Share the ball, get stops, play defense, and rebound — it’s Coach Kirby principles, that’s Three Rivers basketball.”

Pautsch said the win was special in light of the tornadoes that damaged Poplar Bluff the night before

“We had some troubles with the storm yesterday, and I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night, but we worked hard,” Pautsch said. “I love this team, I love the coaches, I love the people around here — it’s just a great place to be.”

Kirby also talked about taking the team to Hutch in his first year as head coach after winning it all as a player in 1979.

“I can’t describe that feeling — it’s unbelievable, because I never thought that that would happen in the first year,” Kirby said. “But I’ve been blessed and I want to give God the credit, and I’ve been blessed with some really great players.”