The Great Escape: Warriors Pull Out Another Win

Ottumwa -- It was quite a weekend for the Indian Hills basketball team. Friday night, they made up an 11-point deficit and came from behind to knock off Kennedy-King in their first game of the Klyn Automotive Classic. Saturday night, it took similar late-game heroics to allow the Warriors to stay undefeated.

Dwan McMillan scored six points in the final 33 seconds and the Warriors held off Ellsworth CC to win 83-79 at the Hellyer Center. McMillan's superb scoop shot allowed the Warriors to go ahead 79-78 with 13.8 seconds to play, just seconds after Ellsworth's L.C. Doss had drilled a three-pointer to put the Panthers ahead by one.

McMillan was fouled on his layup and made the free throw to complete the three-point play at make it 80-78. The Warriors then fouled Doss before he could launch another three and he made the first shot of a one-and-one. When he missed the second attempt, IHCC's Dijon Farr rebounded and was immediately fouled.

Farr made the first foul shot and missed the second to leave the score at 81-79 Indian Hills. Ellsworth grabbed the rebound after the missed free throw and called time out, a time out they didn't have. That resulted in a technical foul and McMillan made both free throws to provide the final margin.

The second half featured scoring runs by both teams. Ellsworth started the final 20 minutes with a 15-2 spurt to ahead 50-49. Bill Freeman, ECC's scoring leader, who was scoreless in the first half, hit two threes to fuel the Ellsworth run.

Freeman's second three put the Panthers ahead by a point, but Bruno Ferreira of Indian Hills scored consecutive baskets to begin a ten-point run for the Warriors. At the end of that run, IHCC was on top 59-50.

Ellsworth slowly cut into the deficit though. Freeman hit a free throw with a minute left to make it 76-72 and, after an Indian Hills turnover, he buried a three to make it a one-point game. McMillan's foul shot with 32.8 seconds remaining gave IHCC a short-lived lead before Doss nailed his three-pointer for Ellsworth's final lead.

Indian Hills ran away to a 15-point first-half lead and was ahead by 12 at halftime. Indian Hills had four 3's in the opening half, from four different players and, after making only 4-of-16 free throws the night before, hit 9-of 13 at the line. McMillan and Garrett combined to score 22 points in the half. John Wolfe came off the bench for Ellsworth to score 10 in the first half and he wound up with 14 points.

Doss led all scorers with 22, one more than Garrett scored for Indian Hills.

With the win, IHCC ended an unbeaten five-game homestand to start the season. The Warriors now embark on a very tough stretch of three road games in five days, starting with a trip to Kirkwood CC on Tuesday night.

INDIAN HILLS 83, ELLSWORTH 79

INDIAN HILLS Dwan McMillan 5 8-9 18, Aaron Austin 1 2-2 5, Brandon Garrett 9 2-2 21, Bruno Ferreira 6 0-1 13, Chano Rashiduddin 0 1-3 1, Derrick Hill 1 1-2 4, Dijon Farr 4 3-6 11, Larry Stone 2 0-0 6, E.J. Hicks 1 0-0 2, Alex Vouyoukas 1 0-0 2, Chad Dillard 0 0-0 0 Team 30 17-25 83

ELLSWORTH Derryl Nash 2 0-0 4, Tut Jikany 0 0-0 0, Cornelius Mosby 3 0-0 6, Bill Freeman 4 4-5 15, Damon Smith 6 0-0 15, L.C. Doss 8 2-4 22, Raylon Canada 0 0-0 0, DeAntwan Jackson 1 0-0 3, Darrell Morgan 0 0-0 0, John Wolfe 5 4-5 14 Team 29 10-14 79

Halftime score: Indian Hills 47, Ellsworth 35; Three-point field goals: IHCC 6 (Stone 2, Austin 1, Garrett 1, Ferreira 1, Hill 1), ECC 11 (Doss 4, Freeman 3, Smith 3, Jackson 1)