The Cincinnati Bearcats were back in Texas on Saturday afternoon to take on top seed Wichita State. The Cincinnati Bearcats were coming off a quarter-final win against the SMU Mustangs. They were in another win or go home situation and had to bring their all to take down a very tough Shockers team. The Bearcats ran out the same lineup that they did yesterday which was; Mike Saunders Jr, Mika Adams-Woods, Keith Williams, Jeremiah Davenport and Chris Vogt. They were ready for the challenge and in hope of making it to the American Conference Championship. Would the Bearcats be able to play spoiler to Wichita State and move on for another day?
The Bearcats started off this game going back and forth against Wichita State as the two teams traded buckets to start off the game as the score was 7-6 after the first three minutes. Wichita State would then follow this back and forth contest by going on a small 6-0 run and taking a 12-7 lead. The Bearcats would fight back though as Keith Williams would take over and put the game in reach for the Bearcats. Williams will go on his own seven point run and would give the Bearcats a 17-16 deficit. The Bearcats would then go on their own small 6-0 run to take a 22-17 lead. The Bearcats would then follow this short run by going back and forth with Wichita State to take a small 25-22 lead heading into the final quarter of the half. Wichita State would fight back to tie the game 29-29 with three minutes remaining in the half. The Bearcats would then end the half with a 6-0 run before the last-second shot by the Tyson Etienne had them down by three at the half. The Bearcats would control the first half of their game and would take a small 35-32 lead heading into the half. The big storyline of the first half is when guard Keith Williams appeared to roll his ankle battling for a position that would have him sitting out for the remainder of the first half. The Bearcats leading score at the half was Keith Williams with nine points on 3-of-6 shooting this would be followed by Jeremiah Davenport who had 6 points on only two shots and a couple of defensive rebounds in the first half. This would be a very tough second half if Keith Williams could not go. Would the Bearcats be able to hang on to their small first-half lead and continue on to the American Conference Finals?
The Bearcats would be without senior guard Keith Williams as he was seen on the sideline in tears. This game meant more to the Bearcats then when they first started due to them being without there senior leader. The Bearcats opened up the second half cold as they could not hit a bucket within the first two minutes but luckily for them neither could Wichita State. Wichita would then go on a run as they would hit a couple of big three’s to take a 40-37 lead with 15 minutes to go. The Bearcats would be held without a bucket for the next 4 minutes as Wichita State opened up a 44-38 lead with 12 minutes to go. The Bearcats would then get a big three from Mason Madsen to cut the lead to 3. The game would then be taken over by the younger core of the Bearcats. Tari Eason made a tough jumper followed by a couple free throws by Jeremiah Davenport and finally followed by a huge three by someone who typically doesn’t shoot three’s, David DeJuilius. This sequence would have the Bearcats down by 3 with 8 minutes to go. The Bearcats would get a couple of big shots by Mason Madsen to have the game knotted up heading into the final 4 minutes of the game. After a timeout was called it was defensive battle between Wichita State and the Bearcats as neither team scored heading into the 2 minute mark. A couple of big free throws by Mika Adams-Woods would give the Bearcats the lead with 2 minutes to go followed with a driving layup by Tari Eason. The final minute would come down to a battle of who could make free-throws and who could get the ball inbounded. Wichita State would hit a big layup to cut the lead to 1 with 14 seconds left. The Bearcats would have to inbound the ball and hope that Tari Eason would be able to make his free-throws. The first free throw was up by Tari Eason and he clanked it off the rim where it was a battle between Jeremiah Davenport and the Wichita back court. Jeremiah Davenport would tip the ball up in the air to himself and grab a huge offensive rebound for the Bearcats. He then would head to the line in hopes of ending this game and sending the Bearcats to another Conference Championship. The dramatic ending was there for the Bearcats as Jeremiah Davenport would miss his first free throw of a 1 and 1 that would fall in the hands of Wichita State. Wichita’s Alterique Gilbert would come down the court for one final chance and would clank the game winning three as the Bearcats would hang on to win 60-59. The leading scorer of the game was Mason Madsen as he had a big second half for the Bearcats putting up eight points (finishing with 10 points) and drilling a couple of huge three’s to keep the Bearcats alive in this one. Keith Williams was the next highest scorer for the Bearcats as he put up nine points in the first half and hopefully will be back in tomorrows game to help the Bearcats earn a bid to the NCAA Tournament.
The Bearcats with this win improved 12-10 on the year and got a huge win that no one expected the young Cincinnati team to pull off. The Bearcats will have a tough matchup tomorrow no matter who wins the next semifinal as they will either play Memphis or Huston. The Bearcats will hope to continue its long streak of consecutive NCAA Tournament bids tomorrow which will be a great game and end of this tournament. The game will be on tomorrow at 3:15 PM on ESPN2.
