Men's Basketball | 3/7/2019 5:42:57 PM

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Top-seeded Northwest Missouri survived an upset bid by eighth-seeded Emporia State, 82-79, in the MIAA Men’s Basketball Championship Quarterfinals at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, Missouri. The 2019 MIAA Basketball Championships are presented by MoDOT’s Buckle Up, Phone Down campaign.

The Bearcats fought off a 54.2 percent three-point shooting effort in the game by the Hornets to advance to the MIAA Semifinals. ESU tied the game on a with a layup from Duncan Fort with 1:36 on the clock. But Joey Witthus scored six straight points over the final 1:12 to preserve NW’s perfect record.

Northwest Missouri advances to play the winner of fourth-seeded Fort Hays State and fifth-seeded Lincoln in the MIAA Men’s Basketball Championship semifinals on Saturday, March 9 at 12 p.m.

NOTABLES
-Northwest’s Joey Witthus and Trevor Hudgins combined for 53 points
-NW’s head coach Ben McCollum won his 16th game in the MIAA Championships
-The Bearcats advance to their 14th MIAA Men’s Basketball Semifinals
-Emporia State’s Julius Jackson scored a tournament-leading 38 points in the game and netted 21 consecutive points in the first half
-ESU shot 75 percent from the three-point arc in the second-half
-The Hornets made their first MIAA quarterfinal appearance since 2014