Wild and a bit wacky. It’s like that anytime Allen County Community College’s Red Devils and Neosho County Community College’s Panthers meet on the basketball court.
And a full house at ACCC gym was not disappointed on Saturday as the two Jayhawk Eastern Division arch-rivals squared off.
The teams waded through a technical situation with nine minutes left in a close game. It was a turning point in the game.
Allen County had just gained a 49-46 lead. Terrell Shears sank both ends of a one-on-one for the Red Devils then Allen County used a defensive stop to push for a transition score.
Terrence Williams was fouled on the layup attempt. Neosho County head coach Jeremy Coombs disagreed with the call and was assessed a technical foul. While officials sorted out the situation, one of the officials called a technical foul on Allen County’s Shears for standing near the NCCC huddle.
So first, Raymond Jeter hit both technical foul shots for the Panthers. Williams dropped in 3 of 4 free throws — two technical and two on the original foul — for the Red Devils.
Allen County led 54-48 but Neosho County came back to lead 59-56 with 4:30 left.
Enter Chris Parker. With the first-half ejection of 6-8 Thomas Daniel and 6-9 Drelan Tripplett fouling out with eight minutes left and Shears, who is 6-7, with four fouls, Allen County head coach Anwar Perry called on the 6-5 freshman to battle Neosho County’s 6-11 Gregoryshon Magee, 6-10 Chris Patton and 6-7 Tyler Hickert.
“Chris did a great job at the end for us. We had several players step up and give us sparks throughout the game. Chris did it at the end when we needed it,” Perry said.
Parker came off the bench and hit two free throws to make it 59-58 then made a steal at the defensive end. That led to Parker scoring and drawing the fifth foul on Magee.
Allen County protected its one-point lead as Williams and Mychael Anderson cleared a defensive rebounds. Canon Fields sank two free throws to bump the lead to 62-59.
Fields stole the basketball leading to a fastbreak layup by Rickey Hollis with 53 seconds. Shears fouled out with 10 seconds later but Patton missed both free throws and Fields pulled the rebound.
Fields hit the first of two attempts at the free-throw line. The second attempt was rebounded by Hollis for ACCC with 36 seconds left to play. Fields and Hollis would step up and hit free throws in the waning seconds.
Neosho County hit a shot at the end for the final margin.
“I told our guys to be ready on the bench because you never know when your time will come to go in and contribute. Tonight, Chris was a big factor when we had to go small against their big guys,” Perry said.
