Saints Suffer Another Setback

The Seward County Saints struggles continued Wednesday night in Garden City’s Perryman Center as the guys in green put together another forgettable performance, losing to the host Broncbusters 91-77 to all of a sudden put their home playoff hopes in serious jeopardy.

In a hostile environment that included a fight in the stands just minutes into the contest, Seward weathered the storm early and got out to a 7-6 lead after a drive and score from Charles Beauregard early on. Garden took the lead back at 13-11 and went on a 12-0 run over the next 5:17 to blow their lead open to 25-12. The Saints simply couldn’t get anything going on the offensive end as the Busters frustrated their movement all night. Before the end of the first half, the Buster lead had swelled to 17 before a late steal and score by Delwin Young made it 43-28 in favor of Garden City at the half.

Seward shot just 34% in the first half and made just 3 of 6 free throw attempts while Garden City shot 47% in the period and was a perfect 10 of 10 at the line. Stevenson led the Saints with 10 first half points as a host of high major NCAA Division I coaches converged on the Perryman Center to watch him.

With Garden City not exactly shooting the lights out of the gym, Seward was able to get back to within eight early in the second half at 43-35. But as soon as they got back in it, they played their way right back out, allowing the Busters to go on a 9-0 run to make it a 17 point game once again with 12:34 to go. With the Saints offense out of sync, Garden City kept them at arm’s length nearly the entire second half. The closest the Saints would get would be 10 with 3:29 remaining but neither their defense nor their rebounding could keep Garden City from once again extending that to as many at 18 before mercifully the contest ended in a 91-77 Buster win.

Seward managed just 11 second half field goals and finished the night shooting 34% from the field. Going up against the league’s second worst rebounding team, just in front of them, the Saints were again beaten badly on the glass with a +13 margin for the Busters. Stevenson and Mitchell Packard each scored 19 in the loss for Seward, Packard’s 19 is a carrer high. Josh Fleming led Garden City with 31 points including a perfect 16 for 16 from the free throw line on the night.

The loss is Seward’s fifth in their past six contests as they fall to 18-10 overall and 8-9 in Jayhawk Conference play where they now sit in a three way tie with Garden City and Butler for the final two home playoff spots with two games to go. The Busters improve to 16-12 overall on the season and push their conference mark up to 8-9 to catch the Saints and Grizzlies.

The reeling Saints will need to find a life preserver and find it fast as they have just two days to prepare before going into the Civic Center on Saturday to take on a Conquistador team that handled them three weeks ago in the Greenhouse 82-74. The Saints and Conqs will tip at 3:00 Saturday.

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Roy Allen