HAYS, Kan. – Fort Hays State punched its ticket to the quarterfinals of the MIAA Tournament in Kansas City with a 71-65 win over Lindenwood on Tuesday night (Feb. 27) at Gross Memorial Coliseum. The No. 7 seed Tigers will now take on No. 2 seed Missouri Southern on Friday (Mar. 2) at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City. FHSU improved to 18-11 overall, while Lindenwood finished its season at 16-13.
 
The Tigers led from start to finish, but not without tense moments late in the game after the lead trimmed to just two with 2:19 to play on a Jackson Price three-point field goal. However, Trey O'Neil had the answer for FHSU with a three of his own on the next possession, pushing the lead back to five at the 1:49 mark. The Tigers used free throws from that point to hold off the Lions.
 
Fort Hays State led 29-22 at halftime, holding Lindenwood to just 33.3 percent shooting from the field in the first half. Both teams were solid with ball security all throughout the game as FHSU committed eight turnovers and Lindenwood had just five, while most possessions took up a good chunk of the shot clock.
 
The Tigers looked to be inching away from the Lions early in the second half, extending their lead to 13 with 13:44 remaining, but Lindenwood kept chipping away and cut the lead down to just four with 4:10 to play. A Brady Werth dunk electrified the crowd with 2:37 remaining, but moments later Price answered with his aforementioned three that cut the margin to just two.
 
Hadley Gillum hit 4-of-6 free-throw attempts in the final 1:03 of the game, while Kyler Kinnamon went 2-of-2 at the line to help FHSU go 6-of-8 overall at the line after O'Neil's three-point field goal. Gillum led the Tigers with a strong double-double effort of 17 points and 11 rebounds, while O'Neil had 16 points and Werth added 14. Kinnamon had a team-high seven assists.
 
With his 10^th rebound of the game, Hadley Gillum became the ninth player in Tiger history to record 1,000 points and 500 rebounds in a career, the last being Corbin Kuntzsch who finished his career with 1,218 points and 626 rebounds in 2011. Gillum now has 1,043 points and 501 rebounds in his career. They are the only two to accomplish the feat under 17^th year head coach Mark Johnson.
 
For the game, FHSU finished at 51.1 percent overall from the field, including a 61.1 percent effort in the second half despite having to hold on in the end. The Tigers hit 80 percent of their charity tosses, going 16-of-20 at the stripe.
 
Brad Newman led the scoring effort for Newman with 26 points on 7-of-13 shooting from the field and a 10-of-11 effort at the free-throw line. Jackson Price had 20 points and Adam Pohlman added 11. The Lions shot 41.9 percent from the field for the game and 81.5 percent at the free-throw line (22-of-27).

The overall score between the teams finished dead even for the season after Lindenwood won in St. Charles during the regular season 69-63, and then FHSU won Tuesday night in Hays 71-65. Just two points more on each side Tuesday night kept the score from being an exact match of the regular season meeting.
 
Fort Hays State will meet Missouri Southern for the sixth time in the MIAA Tournament on Friday at 2:15 pm. It is the most meetings with a team for FHSU in the tournament and FHSU holds a 4-1 edge in those meetings. Missouri Southern got its first-ever MIAA Tournament win over FHSU last year in the quarterfinals by a score of 76-67 when FHSU was the No. 5 seed and MSSU was the No. 4.