Mar. 26—KANSAS CITY, Mo. — There will be a new NAIA men’s basketball champion, after Langston, Okla. knocked off College of Idaho 58-52 in the semifinals Monday night at Municipal Auditorium.
Cortez Mosley scored 14 points for Langston (35-1) and D’Monte Brown added 12 points off the bench as the Lions, down 41-35 with 10:27 left in the game, put together a 13-2 surge to seize momentum.
Brown’s layup with 7:18 left capped the surge and put Langston up 48-43; from there the lead changed hands four times before Jay Allen-Tovar’s layup broke a 52-52 tie with 29 seconds left.
After a miss by the Yotes’ Samaje Morgan, Mosley threw down a dunk with 11 seconds remaining, basically sealing it.
Morgan had 17 points and Jake O’Neil added 10 for College of Idaho (32-4), which won last year’s title game on this same court.
Great Falls High product Drew Wyman added seven points but the Yotes’ Montana-fortified bench had an off night, aside from Straton Rogers’ eight points. Caden Handran (Scobey), Alex Germer (Sentinel) and Dougie Peoples (Butte Central) combined to go 0-for-4 from the field in 20 combined minutes.
Langston will play Freed-Hardman, Tenn., in Tuesday’s final. Freed-Hardman (31-4) beat Grace., Ind. (34-2) in the first semifinal, 86-81.
