After suffering their first loss of the season Tuesday, the Yellowjacket men's basketball team took to the road, again, Friday as they headed 330 miles to the south to Waverly, Iowa and Wartburg College. The Yellowjackets looked to put Tuesday's loss to University of Minnesota-Duluth behind them as they focused on Crown College, a team that will become a regular opponent next season as the Yellowjackets move to the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference. However, tonight's affair was a non-conference contest and Superior showed Crown that they'll be a force to be reckoned with in the future, winning the opening game of the tournament 93-82.

With the win the Yellowjackets advance to the tournament championship, where they will take on the host Knights, who crushed St. Scholastica 72-43 in the other semifinal.
 
Both teams showed up hoping to play an up-and-down game, but instead were subject to stop-and-go ball like rush-hour traffic. A total of 27 fouls were called in the first half. 13 fouls on Superior and 14 on Crown, resulting in a total of 35 free-throw attempts in the first half alone. Fortunately for Superior, Crown made just six of their 18 attempts, yet somehow held a two-point lead at the half, 38-36.
 
In the second half, however, Superior asserted itself.
 
Despite falling behind by as many as nine points in the opening minutes of the second half, Superior roared back with a vengeance. While it took several minutes to dissipate Crown's lead, Superior eventually took control on a layup by Brian Lindblom (Spooner, Wis./Spooner), 58-56, with 11:07 left in the second half. From there, it was all Superior, mostly Lindblom and Ty Ketz (Clayton, Wis./Clayton), as they combined for 36 of Superior's 57 points in the second half. The duo went a combined 11-of-19 from the field, 4-of-7 from three, and 10-of-11 from the line. Superior shot 25 free throws in the second half and hit 21 of them en route to the 57-point half.
 
While the defense was suspect for the third game in a row to start the season, Superior showed that it's offense was no joke. They scored a season-high 93 points despite shooting 43.5% from the field. They made 33-of-42 free-throws, 18 more than Crown.
 
Lindblom led the way for Superior with a career-high 29 points and Ketz poured in 26 to help the Yellowjackets cause. Johnquez Brooks (North Las Vegas, Nev./Valley) score 17 points despite poor shooting from the field (3-of-9) but was 11-of-11 from the free-throw line. Sophmore Cole Minnich (Brooklyn Park, Minn./Champlin Park) was extremely aggressive tonight as he scored a career-high 17 points and got to the line 11 times, making eight of his 11 attempts.
 
James Brown led Crown College with 21 points on 10-of-20 shooting.
 
The Yellowjackets (2-1, 0-0 WIAC) and Wartburg will battle for the tournament championship tomorrow at 4:00 p.m.