With a sold-out home crowd Lee Arena, the Washburn University Ichabods became members of the Elite Eight as they won the Central Regional Championship. 

“I don’t want to be done yet. I mean, this is my senior year. I hope we can still get some more wins,” said Jacob Hanna, senior guard. “There’s still some more goals to reach, but it definitely feels good to reach this one.”

The Ichabods played the Minnesota State University-Moorhead Dragons for the spot in the NCAA DII Elite Eight. These two teams had only played each other once before, with the Dragons beating the Ichabods. 

Washburn men’s basketball won their quarterfinal game on Saturday, March 15, and their semifinal game on Sunday. All three of these games had a large hometown crowd as the Ichabods got to host the regional tournament for the first time since 2001, which was also the last time they were regional champs. 

“This is amazing. I’ve never seen Topeka surround a community like they surrounded us. I think it shows the last three games we’ve had, they’ve really shown how much they care for us,” said Andrew Orr, senior forward.

While the weekend games started off with a Washburn tip-off and first score, the Dragons decided to shut that down for the final game as they won the tip and were the first to put points on the board with a 3-pointer right off the bat. 

However, Washburn wasn’t far behind as Brayden Shorter, sophomore guard, soon followed up with his own 3-pointer to put the Ichabods on the scoreboard. Shorter was responsible for 21 of Washburn’s final 93 points. 

“We played at a really high level, and I think our guys deserve a lot of credit for just the performance,” said Brett Ballard, men’s basketball head coach. “You can do all the right things, but when the lights come on, you [have] to perform. And these guys rose to the occasion and answered the bell.”

At halftime, the score was 47-41 with the Ichabods in the lead by a narrow margin. The second half of the game started off Washburn strong with Michael Keegan, senior guard, leaping towards the rim for a dunk. 

Only a few minutes later, Keegan got injured when trying to keep the ball in bounds. He slammed his side into the edge of the goal stand and took a few minutes before he got up and was assisted off the court to be examined.

“He got back out there, so obviously the training staff felt good enough that he was good to go. He’ll probably be a little bit sore,” Ballard said. 

As the game continued, Jack Bachelor, sophomore guard, had the opportunity to shoot two free throws after a technical foul at 16:34 in the second half by Moorhead’s Logan Kinsey, junior forward. Bachelor put up 16 points and 10 assists for the game. 

Keegan was back on the bench from the locker room with 15 minutes left of the second half but didn’t officially go back in the game until there was 9:49 left on the clock when he immediately assisted Shorter in a layup. 

Washburn’s defense stepped up in the second half and the team was able to create a bigger difference on the scoreboard. The final score of the night was 93-65 with a Washburn win. 

The Most Valuable Player award of the Central Regional Tournament went to Hanna during the celebration of the win. Orr, Bachelor and Hanna were named to the all-tournament team. 

“[I’m] thankful for my teammates, thankful for the coaches, thankful for [the] opportunity to come to Washburn and also the fans out there,” Hanna said. 

This team previously picked up a few postseason awards such as Ballard winning coach of the year, and Hanna winning both defensive player of the year and newcomer of the year. Other players were named to the MIAA all-defensive team, and All-MIAA first, second and third teams. 

After the initial celebration, the team cut a piece of the net while the song “We Are the Champions” by Queen played. Ballard cut the majority of it off, and other basketball staff kept a piece as a keepsake in addition to the players. 

“I do want to just say thank you to everybody that’s worked on this tournament, the committee, our SID team, our marketing team, our facilities crew. It takes a lot of work to put this on, and I thought we put on a first-class event,” Ballard said. 

The Ichabods advance to the Elite Eight in Evansville, Indiana in the national quarterfinals March 25. 

For this new bracket, they are listed as the No. 4 seed with a record of 29-3 and will be playing the No. 5 seed Lenoir-Rhyne University with a 29-5 record 

Edited by Morgan Albrecht