State Fair Community College men’s and women’s basketball were eliminated in the Region 16 Tournament on Friday at Lincoln University in Jefferson City, finishing its respective seasons.
Crowder College upset the No. 2 seed Lady Roadrunners with a comeback that included six second-half 3-pointers that shook down State Fair’s the 16-point lead.
For a loss by the score of 100-82, the men ended its season in peculiar fashion — with three men on the floor.
With nine minutes to play, contact between the Moberly bench, Roadrunner forwards Isaac Bassey and Jamar Kemp and Greyhound guard Brandon Better culminated into a benches-clearing brouhaha.
Officials disqualified both team’s bench players — anyone who left their seat — leaving a State Fair assistant, head coach Kevin Thomas and athletic director Darren Pannier alone on the Roadrunner sideline.
Jamar Kemp, Vonny Irvin, Isaac Bassey, Russel Baker and Onteral Woodson Jr. finished the remainder of the game in a 5-on-5 matchup with Moberly’s Demarco Owens, Mar’Qywell Jackson, Brandon Better, Jabari Antwine and Leonard Harper-Baker, trailing 67-59.
Irvin, who led the Roadrunners with 18 points, and Kemp, who had 10 points, fouled out in the final minute.
Thomas was reminded of a similar scene in 2014, when State Fair woud go on to defeat Moberly 84-70 in the tournament. He said it was an unfortunate delay of a good basketball game.
“With all the team ejected — we had both bigs on the floor — it was hard to get back into rhythm.”
On the girl’s side, giving up an 11-point halftime lead to Crowder was a bitter disappointment.
“We just played horrible in the second half,” said Lady Roadrunner head coach Kevin Bucher. “They started hitting threes, and we got away from how we wanted to defend them.”
Michaela Mack and Kadesha Cooper scored off consecutive SFCC turnovers to earn the first Crowder lead, 63-62.
With under a minute to play and two Lady Roadrunners trapped under a screen, Cooper hit a 3-pointer that put the Lady Riders ahead, 70-67.
Alexis Cowan squared a final 3-point attempt, but missed off the rim. She finished with 12 points.
Danaé Cole and Maya Brewer had 15 each to lead four SFCC players with double-digit scoring. Ahjana Oakes added 14 points.
The Lady Roadrunners finished with a 19-9 record, while the men finished 11-19 overall.
