HASKELL— Both women’s and mens’ basketball teams were each selected as one of the eight teams that will participate in the 2019 Association of Independent Institutions (A.I.I) conference tournament taking place in Lincoln, Ill. this upcoming weekend.
Men’s placed as the No. 5 Seed with a 12-15 record. Team captain; Bryon Elledge stated that he’s very confident going into the tourament.
Haskell women’s earned the No.3 Seed with a record of 20-8. Sierra Penn (Diné), team captain, said “I am excited for us to go into playoffs, I think we have a good chance of mak- ing it to the championship. Although we recently lost a player due to a stress fracture, we’re really not trying to look at the negatives, we’re just focusing on the positives and also keeping in mind of how far we’ve came from the beginning of the semester. We’re just going to take it game-by- game and hopefully we can make it through.”
Quarterfinals will take place Friday; Feb. 22. Men’s will face off with College of the Ozarks (Mo.), the No. four Seed with a 18-9 record at 5:30 PM cst. Womens will play at 7:30 PM cst against the No. 6 Seed Voorhees College (15-12).
If the Men’s get the victory they will face off with either the No. 1 Seed Indiana University Southwest (21-6) or the No. 8 Seed Lincoln Christian University (11-16) in the semifinals on Saturday, Feb. 23 at 5:30 PM cst.
Tristan Keah-tigh, said “This is my first time going. I’m really excited to go into playoffs knowing that as a team we overcame the obstacles that we experienced at the beginning of the season.” Keah-tigh ended in saying that “I would like to thank all the students and supporters who have came out and watched us, although we had some losses, you all still believed in us and kept faith in us.”
The men’s championship game is set for Sunday, Feb. 24 at 7:30PM cst. The women’s championship is set for the same day at 4:00 PM cst.
