KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The Washburn Ichabods advanced to their 12^th MIAA Championship game in school history and their second straight with a 99-94 win over Pittsburg State on Saturday in the MIAA semifinals in Municipal Auditorium. For the second year in a row the Ichabods will square off with No. 1-ranked Northwest Missouri in the title game at 1 p.m. on Sunday.
 
After leading 44-41 at the break, the Ichabods pushed their lead out to as many as 13 points with 4:30 to go in the game before the Gorillas cut the lead to five with 2:39 to go in the game. Washburn rallied and pushed the margin back to eight at 91-83 with 2:20 to go with a 3-pointer by Tyler Geiman but the Gorillas came back with to trim the margin back to as few as five on five times in the final 35 seconds but could not get any closer as the Ichabods improved to 6-0 all-time against Pittsburg State in the MIAA Tournament.
 
Javion Blake the Ichabods with 34 points scoring 22 in the first half. The 34 points were two shy of his career high scored in the first game of the season against Oklahoma Baptist. Blake also added five rebounds and four assists. David Salach scored 21 points with eight rebounds and Geiman had 17 points with seven assists and seven rebounds.
 
Washburn (24-6) shot 71 percent from the field in the second half en route to a 58 percent effort for the game hitting 37 of 64 shots compared to 45 percent by the Gorillas (17-13) in the game.
 
Washburn also held a 39 to 35 advantage on the glass and outscored the Gorillas 50 to 34 in the paint and 17 to 2 in bench points.
 
The Ichabods lost in both meetings with Northwest Missouri falling 83-75 in Maryville on Jan. 12 and 72-49 on Feb. 28 in Topeka.
 
The Bearcats won in the MIAA Championship game in 2018 on March 4 in an 80-74 win.