OTTAWA - The Kansas Wesleyan men had the lead for just 2.2 seconds in their game against Ottawa - but it was long enough.
Caiden Punt's off-balance basket in the lane that banked in off the glass with 2.2 seconds left and lifted the Coyotes to a wild and crazy 73-72 Kansas Conference victory on Saturday afternoon in Wilson Field House. Punt preserved it by poking the ball away from an Ottawa player on the ensuing inbounds pass as time expired.
Unfortunately, though KWU's season ended Saturday night when Avila edged Tabor 91-89 in Hillsboro. The Coyotes and Eagles entered the day tied for eighth in the KCAC standings, but Avila had the tiebreaker after winning 75-71 in their lone meeting in January and gained the eighth seed. The top eight teams in the final standings qualify for the tournament.
Wesleyan ended the season on a roll, winning five of its last six games and finishing 14-14, 12-9 in the conference. Ottawa fell to 10-18 and 6-16.
Punt's heroics came 3.5 seconds after he returned to the game. He had departed with 5:17 remaining after being leveled by an Ottawa player as he drove to the basket.
"Everyone believed in me the second that we were in the position," Punt said on the postgame radio show. "Everyone said they wanted to go to me, so I knew it was in my hands. I knew I had to come up big for the team."
Punt said the injury was no joke.
"That was some of the worst pain I've been in my life, I'm not going to lie," he said. "He came out of nowhere, smacked me up. ... The adrenaline gets you through that moment."
Coach Jordan Murdock was proud of his team's resilience.
"That's part of what we've been talking about all year long, just being able to be present through all of the extra stuff that's happening on the court," he said on the radio show. "We can't control referees and so what we can do is control our ability to go out and play hard and not let those external factors get to us. I thought Caiden was a true representative of that tonight.
"For him to come back into the game after something like that was huge and I'm just proud of that guy for everything he gives to our team."
The Coyotes trailed 46-36 at halftime, fell behind 59-45 with 15 minutes left and were down 68-59 at the 7½ minute mark. That's when they embarked on their comeback, going on a 10-2 run capped by a Brandon Avedon 3-pointer to get within 70-69 with 1:54 left. Ottawa scored and led 72-69 at the 1:12 mark but Evens Appolon's follow shot with 46 seconds remaining cut the deficit to 72-71.
After an Ottawa turnover the Coyotes missed a shot, but grabbed the offensive rebound and called time out with 5.7 seconds left to set up the final play.
Punt finished with a game-high 22 points along with six rebounds and two assists. Avedon scored 19, 11 in the second half, and had four assists while Appolon finished with 16 points on 7 of 8 shooting and had nine rebounds
"I'm ecstatic for our guys, just the resiliency to stay together," Murdock said. "We had a bunch of adversity. I told the team late in the game when we were down 10 this game is going to come down to can we keep our mental together and understand that we've got to stop giving up free points, and we did that. That's the growth of this team."