KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- UPIKE men's basketball survived a late comeback attempt and advanced to the second round of the NAIA DI Men's Basketball National Championship on Thursday with a 69-65 win against Talladega.
After UPIKE held a 13-point lead in the second half, Talladega came back and had the game tied with 1:35 left in the game. But, the Bears took advantage of the Tornadoes foul trouble in the second half and made 5-of-6 free throws down the stretch to win.
All six of those free throw attempts came from junior guard Chase Parsley, who had arguably the best game of his UPIKE career on Thursday. Parsley scored a career-high tying 19 points on 4-of-8 shooting, including a 8-of-9 mark from the free throw stripe. He also had seven rebounds and three assists.
But Parsley was not alone in his offensive outburst as Jovontae Carleton also scored 19 points on 6-of-9 shooting. Carleton got the Bears through some tough opening minutes by scoring UPIKE's first eight points which mostly erased an early six point lead for the Tornadoes.
Gallery: (3/21/2019) MBB vs Talladega NAIA 1st Round
Talladega established itself with a physical presence early by dominating the boards early, building up an 11-0 edge to start. Part of that was Talladega crashing the offensive glass hard, but also UPIKE's strong shooting start.
The Bears shot 50 percent from the floor and 90 percent from the free throw stripe in the first half to overcome that rebound deficit and go into halftime with a four-point lead.
Pikeville came out of the halftime break fired up, opening the half with a 9-0 run. Shortly after that, Talladega went a 16-3 run to take its first lead since the 16:07 mark of the first half. UPIKE quickly responded with back-to-back buckets to retake the lead.
From that point on, Talladega tied the game two more times, but UPIKE never trailed for the rest of the game. Talladega accumulated four fouls in the first two minutes of the second half, and because of that, the Bears didn't make a field goal for the last 4:55 of the game, instead going to the free throw line 10 times, making eight of those attempts.
Luke Layhew provided another steady game that has become routine for him of late, with 15 points and a team-high eight rebounds.
With the win, UPIKE's record at the NAIA National Championship now sits at 14-11 overall in 13 total appearances. This will be the sixth time in program history UPIKE reaches the second round.
The Bears will face the winner of tonight's matchup between No. 1 Benedictine (Kan.) and No. 8 Westmont (Calif.) tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. CT / 8:30 p.m. ET at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City.
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