Defending champ Danville stays alive in wild 2A finish

The class 2A quarterfinal round continues at the Boys’ State Basketball Tournament.Last year, Danville posted a shocking first round upset enroute to a surprising run to the class 2A crown. Today, the Bears were seconds away from being on the receiving end. Todd Haupt’s three pointer with six seconds remaining gave Grundy Center a 45-42 lead but Danville standout Jake Wenig followed with a half court bomb at the buzzer to force overtime and Danville escaped with a 56-52 win. He says he looked up to see four seconds on the clock and just tried to get as close as he could before throwing up the shot. He says, “Thank God it went in.”Wenig says there was a much different feeling coming into this year’s tournament as the defending champ as everyone is not quite as excited and all the other teams are seeking to beat the defending champ. He says they’ll have to play harder to defend the title.Wenig finished with a game high 22-points and also added 14 rebounds. Haupt led Grundy center with 18 points before fouling out late in overtime. Haupt says even after the half court shot he had a good feeling about going into overtime.Grundy Center coach Rollie Ackerman felt his team responded after such a deflating end to regulation. He told them at least they get to play four more minutes in the tourney and they shouldn’t get down.