Surprising Early Loss for Eagles in Quarterfinals of AAC

David Finney | photo by Gian-Luca Fahling

Kingsport, TN - The Eagles were coming off a great regular season where they worked hard and earned a first-round bye in the AAC Tournament. Their opponent would be Columbia International University (CIU) who earned their way to the quarterfinal game by beating Johnson University (TN) in the opening round.

There were many reasons to be confident going into this game for the Eagles looking at the season matchups, however, the two teams did split during the regular season. CIU won at their place by an eight-point margin, but when the two-faced in early February - the Eagles were a different team and playing tremendous basketball. Reinhardt won the February game with a convincing fifteen-point margin. In tournament play, there are reasons to be confident, but you do have to get the work done on the court. The records and previous matchups go away once the ball is tipped and this game was going to be a battle as neither wanted to go home early.

In the first half, the game would start with each team getting narrow one or two point leads. The game would go through several lead changes and ties for the first ten minutes. Tyler Smith would hit two layups to get the Eagles' scoring started and it was followed by a three-pointer by Jalin Wimberly. Smith was very active to start as he hustled for loose balls, played tight defense, and was putting his head near the rim on layups and dunks. Tafari Thomas was showing similar athleticism getting up on a dunk of his own and pulling down rebounds.  Everything in the first half seemed to be going as planned for the Eagles and they would have a narrow four-point lead at the half, 37-33.

The second half would start very similar to the first half, but the Eagles were able to maintain their narrow lead for several minutes into the second half. Greg Hobbs and Nate Louis stepped up their scoring in the second half. Around the eleven minutes mark, the Eagles would see their largest lead of the game at ten points, 54-44, when Josh Press scored on a layup. The Eagles just needed to keep what they were doing and it would match their previous games leading up to the tournament.  This was usually the point where the Eagles would put a team away, however, CIU was not ready to go home and close out their season. Around eight minutes left in the game, CIU would tie the game at 58 all, and then the game would go back to several lead changes and ties until one minute left in the game. CIU hit a key three-pointer to put them up by seven. A missed three-pointer by the Eagles allowed CIU to go up by nine with just thirty seconds left in the game.  The Eagles had to foul to make the Rams win the game at the line. Although Reinhardt was able to get the lead to just four, CIU was able to make their free throws in the final seconds and the Eagles would walk away thinking what if…  The final would be 84-80 for CIU.

Tyler Smith would lead the Eagles in scoring with 22 points followed by Nate Louis who had 11 points coming off the bench. Greg Hobbs would put up 9 points and Tafari Thomas and Jalin Wimberly would have 8 points each.

It was a surprising and devastating blow to the Eagles who have been playing great basketball the second half of the season. At times, they are no doubt the best team in the AAC - but now they are leaving the AAC Tournament wondering if this was their last game or will there be hope of an at-large bid to the NAIA National Tournament. Only time will tell now as the decision is out of their hands as they will be watching the AAC semifinals taking place Friday evening and the Championship game on Saturday.