Missouri Class 3 boys basketball semifinals: Lafayette pulls upset over Thayer; Charleston edges Duchesne

The two teams will meet Friday afternoon for the title.

 Story and photo by Cody Thorn

SPRINGFIELD — The scoreboard read 58-58 for what seemed like an eternity.

That marked the eighth time on Thursday that Thayer and Lafayette County were tied in the Class 3 semifinal game at the MSHSAA Show-Me Showdown at JQH Arena. 

Nearly two full minutes ticked off the clock before Gaige Pitts hit a free throw with 37 seconds left for No. 1-ranked Thayer. The lead changed hands for the penultimate time.

Lafayette County, ranked No. 4, managed to score six points over the final 13 seconds to pull off the upset, 64-59.

Two key rebounds and timely shooting moved the Huskers (30-1) into the championship game at 4 p.m. Friday against Charleston, ranked No. 3 in the state.

Junior Josiah Golden scored on a layup with 13 seconds to go and drew the foul. With the lead in tow, Golden went to the line.

He missed his shot but grabbed the rebound and drew another foul, this time going to the line again facing a 1-and-1 situation. Golden, the hero in the quarterfinal win against Mid-Buchanan, drained two with 9 seconds left, making it 62-59.

Thayer (28-2) shot a 3-pointer with 5 seconds left that could’ve tied it but it was short.

Kzyer Gann-Vega drew a foul with 2 ticks remaining and hit both free-throw attempts to account for the final score.

“I was confident up by three,” said Gann-Vega, who scored 14 points. “I wanted to solidify the win. As the year went on I noticed my free throw (percentage) drop so I was nervous when I got the line but I made the first one and the second one felt pure stroke. When it went in, I felt good about the situation.”

Added Huskers coach Jim Stoner, “We had the ball in the right hands, (Josiah) Golden, Kyzer (Gann-Vega) and (Mason) Rumsey. We trust them all made big free throws at some point. Rumsey, in the district championship game, hit four in a row to finish off St. Michael’s. Golden last Saturday and today, Kyzer. He is a player that is at his best when he is turned loose and going 150 miles per hour. He has a nice stroke when he steps up and shoots with confidence.”

Lafayette County had three in double figures, led by 25 from Rumsey, who also had a team-high seven rebounds. Golden had 13 to go with four assists and six rebounds and the go-ahead bucket.

Thayer had its 16-game winning streak snapped in the loss. The Bobcats were down by five points early in the fourth but used a 10-4 run to take the lead back and was up 57-54 following a layup by sophomore Aidan Burns with 4:30 to play. Senior guard Jordan Andrews hit a pair of shots to start the run for the Bobcats.

The only quarter the lead didn’t change was in the second, as Lafayette County possessed a 22-19 after the first. The Huskers went up by as many as eight but the Bobcats closed the half on an 11-3 run to forge a 30-30 tie at halftime. Andrews added four of his team-high 24 points during the run. Three other Thayer players were in double figures: Keaton Nicholson with 11, while Gaige Pitts and Burns had 10 apiece.

“These guys set out to win,” Thayer coach Matt Pitts said. “We lost in the quarterfinal game last year and didn’t play well that night. We had all those guys coming back and our goal was to get here and not only get here, but win it. We came up short today. It was never easy for either side. I couldn’t be more proud. That was for real a battle. If that game is played 10 times between those two, I think it is pretty darn even.”

Lafayette County, by virtue of the win, secured the best finish in school history in the Show-Me Showdown regardless of what happens against Charleston.

In four previous trips to the final four – 1963, 1974, 1982 and 1983 – the Huskers were fourth each time.

This is Charleston’s 24th trip to the final four and it has won 11 of them.

“I admire what they have done through the years, 11 or 12 state titles and 24 final fours,” Stoner said. “I admire that, it is awesome. But at the same time it is about what will happen the next 32 minutes on the floor tomorrow. We got this far. We are 32 minutes away. I tell them and I will tell them again, ‘I believe in you’ and that is how we will approach it.”

Charleston 56, Duchesne 53

The upstart Pioneers nearly extended a five-game winning streak against a state power in the first semifinal game on Thursday.

Duchesne was making its first trip to the final four and was perhaps a little shell-shocked at first, falling behind 16-9. The Blue Jays (28-3) continued to push the pace offensively and went up by 10 points twice, 22-12 and 24-14, in the first three-plus minutes of the second quarter.

The unranked Pioneers never backed down and kept battling, using a 10-3 run, to pull within a possession with 2 ½ minutes left in the first half. Ethan Kissell, who had a team-high 17 points, had a layup and 3-pointer during the run.

By halftime the Charleston lead was down to a possession, 33-30.

“I was hoping we could spread the game out and create a margin of comfort,” Charleston coach Jamarcus Williams said. “Unfortunately that didn’t happen and we got sloppy. We stopped scoring inside, we had success inside early. They started making shots and went on a run and things went south briefly.”

Early in the third, Duchesne (15-17) took a lead on a layup from junior Amorion Oliphant – 36-35 with 4:42 to play – but freshman PJ Farmer answered with a jumper to give the Blue Jays the lead back for good.

Duchesne never held the lead again but never went away either. Late in the fourth, a 3-point play by Farmer – who had a game-high 22 – gave the Blue Jays a seven-point lead with less than five minutes to play.

Three minutes later, a 3-pointer by Josh Baker-Mays and a layup by Kissell had cut the deficit down to 53-51 with less than 2 minutes to play. The Pioneers missed a 3-pointer with 14 seconds left that would’ve tied the game. The miss turned into a rebound by Farmer, who went down the court and scored on a layup with 8 seconds left to seal the win.

“I watched the game film against Monroe City and they were down 10 and they won,” Williams said. “I watched the game film from Bishop DuBourg and they were down 16 and came back and won that. They are one of those teams that won’t go away. Some teams can’t play down. Obviously they have been in that situation several times so it was nothing new about it to them.”

The Pioneers held the Blue Jays to their third lowest scoring game of the season and nearly 20 points below the team’s 74.1 points per game average.

A key was Duchesne neutralizing guards Alamarion Williams (11.1 ppg) and Fletravion Stanback (13.4 ppg) to a combined four points and nine turnovers.

“Sometimes the plays go your way and sometimes they don’t,” Duchesne coach Wade Bouslog said. “It doesn’t change what these guys have done and where we came from to get here and be where we are at. I like where this team is and as much as you don’t want to play in the third-place game, I’m excited to coach again tomorrow.”