Box Score Chanute, KS - Despite shooting a season low 19% from 3 and 27% from the field the Panthers found themselves in a dogfight with the Jayhawks 5th seeded Garden City Busters for 36 minutes of the game but struggled to score in the final 4 minutes.
 
"It was definitely one of those games that could have gone either way," Panthers head coach Jeremy Coombs said. "Their size really gives us fits and they did a nice job of running our shooters off the three-point line."
 
It's was also that size that helped Garden grab 13 offensive boards and dominate the paint. The three Garden big men combined for 35 of the Busters 68 points.
 
"I thought early we did a nice job of limiting their bigs touches," Panthers head coach Jeremy Coombs said. "But late we struggled to keep the ball out of their hands and had a hard time keeping them off the glass."
 
The Panthers hit just 27% (8 of 29) of their shots and were 2 of 13 from three in the first half. Finding themselves down 27-36 going into the locker room at halftime.
 
The second half pretty much mirrored the past few games as the Panthers found themselves battling toe to toe but fell short in the final minutes of the game.
 
"We have been in this situation several times this year when the game could have gone either way," said Coach Jeremy Coombs. "As a coach I need to do a better job of finding ways for these guys to win those close ballgames."

With 4 min to play Neosho found themselves down 4 points with the ball, but the Busters wouldn't fold and ended the game on a 14-6 run to finish the Panthers off 58-68.

The Panthers have two more regular season games, Saturday at Butler County and back home Monday for sophomore night vs Barton County. Both games will be played at 7:30pm. Panthers will be on the road for the first round of the Region VI tournament on March 1st.
 
Looking at Neosho's stats...
18-65 from the field 27%
6-31 from three-point range 19%
16-21 from the free-throw 76%
 
Lual Dung 12pts
Austin Downing 11pts
Montrell Dixson 10pts