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| Ty Nichols led We Are D3 with 17 points, despite suffering a knee injury in the third quarter. The Basketball Tournament photo |
With their leading scorer hobbled, the team of Division III alumni at The Basketball Tournament still rallied, was tied at the Elam Ending, and took the defending champs all the way to the last basket before losing 70-68.
It's the second consecutive summer that We Are D3 took a No. 1 seed all the way down to the final moments, as We Are D3 gave Heartfire heartburn before the tournament's defensing champ pulled out the win.
We Are D3 held D.J. Kennedy, the two-time TBT MVP, to just 11 points on 3-for-6 shooting, but the D3 alumni did not have an answer for Tevin Mack, who went off to the tune of 25 points.
Meanwhile, Heartfire found a way to limit Dimitrius Underwood and Alex Sobel, holding Underwood to nine points and Sobel to eight.
Ty Nichols scored eight points in the first quarter alone, as We Are D3 scored seven of the game's first nine points. Coach Mike Rejniak's crew came out hot in the second quarter, taking a 28-21 lead on a Jeffrey Hunter transition slam dunk with 3:40 to play in the half before Heartfire scored 10 of the final 12 points of the quarter to go into the locker room up 31-30.
After halftime, Nichols fed Josh Treadwell for a midrange jumper, then hit a three and Underwood threw one down to make it 37-32, but Heartfire rallied again and the teams went to the final quarter tied at 50. In the fourth, Heartfire edged out to a four-point lead, matching its biggest of the game, with just over a minute to go before the final score would be set with the Elam Ending coming at the first deadball with under four minutes to play. But Ty Nichols was fouled and hit all three foul shots to but it to one, and Da'Kquan Davis hit a huge 3-pointer with 3:59 left to tie it at 61, setting the winning score at 69.
Davis hit another huge three to give We Are D3 a 66-65 lead and put the team one made 3-pointer away from winning, but the team missed three 3-point attempts, a foul shot and a mid-range jumper before Nichols found Sobel for a layup underneath to tie the game at 68. But Mack got a putback for Heartfire on its next possession for the 80-78 win.