PARK HIILLS, Mo. — The Raiders toppled a top-10 team and their first opponent in the upcoming Region XVI Tournament on Saturday. Down 10 early in the second half, Three Rivers College rallied to beat No. 7 Mineral Area College 70-68. "I've told people, we can beat either one of those teams. We've got to beat them back to back and it will be tougher the next time," said Three Rivers coach Gene Bess, now with 1,553 career wins. "If our guys can play as well as they did tonight and play a little bit better, we might get by two games and get where we want to go."
Mineral Area's only other loss this season was to Moberly Area. "We had really good support from our bench, and we had a really nice crowd up there too. That really helps when you are on the road when you have a great bunch of followers," Bess said. With 2 minutes to play, the Cardinals followed a pair of free throws with a steal and a layup to cut the Raiders' lead to a point. Gabe Grant drew a foul and hit a free throw at the other end. With a chance to tie and 90 seconds left, the Cardinals got the ball to Amar Miller, who drove and was called for an offensive foul.
Three Rivers (22-7, 5-3 Region XVI) beat the press, Camron Reedus missed an open 3 but Kavion Pippen grabbed the offensive rebound. Aidan Saunders soon missed a jumper, and Pippen was there for another board. The Cardinals (26- 2, 5-2) eventually got a complete stop, and laid in baseline bucket at the other end. Three Rivers beat the press before the Cardinals fouled Jeffery Porter with 22 seconds left. He made the fi rst to put the Raiders ahead by three. Shawn Roundtree got a quick bucket for the Cardinals at the other end to cut the lead to a point with 14 seconds to go. The Raiders got the ball in and the Cardinals initially tried to go for the steal as time ticked away, and 8 seconds rolled off the clock before Three Rivers called a timeout.
"They were trying to get it into the hands of somebody who couldn't shoot," Bess said. With 5.1 seconds on the clock, Grant inbounded the ball to Sadaeys Miller, who was fouled with a second ticking off the clock. Miller made the fi rst and missed the second foul shot. A 47 percent free-throw shooter for the season, Miller was 6 for 8 at the line to lead the Raiders. "He did an excellent job tonight taking care of the ball and then making his free throws," Bess said of Miller. The Cardinals raced up the fl oor, and fumbled the ball out of bounds on an attempted pass to Roundtree, giving the Raiders possession and the win with 0.1 remaining.
"I thought Pippen and Aiden, Sadaeys had a good ball game. Porter had his moments," Bess said. Saunders, who had 20 points in the previous meeting, had the fi rst fi ve points of the game after sinking a kickout pass from Terrence Parker for a 3, and then a jumper. He scored Three Rivers' fi rst seven points and led all scorers with 21.
"He just got a lot of little in-between shots, just played really well," Bess said. "He's pretty good on the offensive end of the court, believe me." Pippen added 15 points, seven of that in the fi nal 8 minutes, and 12 rebounds for his second double-double of the season. Camron Reedus added 12 points and Porter fi nished with four points, two rebounds and two assists. With MSU-West Plains ineligible for postseason play this year, Three Rivers will play the Cardinals in a rubber match in the Region XVI Tournament semifi nals, and No. 1 seed Moberly Area will play State Fair. Mineral Area beat Three Rivers by two points in overtime in early January