Whitworth men suffer heartbreaking defeat

ATLANTA – The NCAA Division III tournament is a whirlwind of emotions and the Whitworth Pirates played through an epic spin cycle which left them in a daze after falling to host-school Emory in the second round, 85-84.

The Pirates overcame a double digit lead in the first half, then mounted one of their own in the second, only to blow it in the end to close out the season with a heartbreaking defeat.

“It was a game of runs. I thought Emory put a good first punch on in the first half to build a lead,” said Whitworth coach Matt Logie. “We had to settle down and respond. We did a great job of that to go up by three at the half. We kept that momentum in the second half. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to protect the basketball as well as we would’ve liked as Emory made its comeback.”  

Early in the first half, the Pirates had a hard time guarding the perimeter. Emory’s Jonathan Terry pulled up at will, draining 4 of 6 from behind the 3-point arc in the stanza to record 18 first-half points. This prolific shooting put the hometown Eagles on top 29-19 with 7:05 left on the clock.

From that moment on, the Pirates caught fire on both ends of the floor and closed out the half on a 21-8 run to go up 40-37 at intermission.

The dominance carried over to the second half as the Pirates built a 76-65 lead with 7:26 left to go in regulation. Unfortunately, the superior play which served them so well from near the close of the first half till this juncture, soon disappeared as the Eagles implemented a rally of their own.

With the game all square at 83, and 28 seconds remaining, George Valle hit 1 of 2 free throws to put the Whits up 84-83.

Emory turned the ball over on its ensuing possession, but Whitworth was unable to eat the remaining precious seconds off the clock. On the inbound pass, Valle attempted to toss the ball to the other end over the defense. To his and the team’s dismay, the long-distance pass was too far and the ball bounced out of bounds.

The Eagles took the ball and managed to breakdown the defense with Davis Rao drawing a foul with 5.3 seconds remaining. Rao went to the line, for his only free throw attempts for the game, and nailed both shots to put his team on top by one.

Whitworth had one last stab to win the game, but Valle’s heave from 3-point land fell short.