The Manhattan High boys are headed back to state.<\/p>\n
The No. 4-seeded Indians took care of business on their home floor Saturday night, taking down No. 5 Wichita East 57-48 in the sub-state championship. Manhattan enters the Class 6A state tournament with a 17-7 record and an outright Centennial League title.<\/p>\n
After missing the mark the past two seasons, Manhattan returns to the state tournament for the first time since 2023, when it nearly pulled off a first-round upset of No. 2 seed Blue Valley North before falling 44-39 in overtime.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels so good,\u201d head coach Benji George said on going back to state. \u201cI told the players early in the year that I\u2019ve never had such a clear vision of how I wanted a team to play. And I don’t know if they quite saw it yet, but they could kind of squint and see it. I told them we were going to start out looking like a garage band, but by the end, we were going to be the New York Symphony.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd we\u2019re not there yet \u2014 we have a lot more work to do. But that has to be \u2014 especially on the defensive end of the floor \u2014 as well as we played all year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Manhattan was led in scoring down the stretch by senior guards Will Carpenter and Vince Doering. Carpenter finished with 15 points, including 11 in the second half, while Doering added 13 points with nine coming after halftime.<\/p>\n
\u201cWinning the paint was huge,\u201d George said. \u201cI\u2019m just so proud we were tougher for longer.\u201d<\/p>\n
How it happened<\/p>\n
Manhattan made a living inside early, drawing fouls and converting at the rim while relying on defensive intensity on the other end. The Indians led by as many as seven early, but a late Blue Aces 3-pointer cut the margin to 11-7 at the end of the first quarter.<\/p>\n
The defensive tone carried into the second period as points came at a premium. Sophomore forward Tyson Hattrup knocked down his first triple of the season and finished with 7 first-half points, helping Manhattan build a 23-12 halftime lead.<\/p>\n
The Indians carried that momentum into the second half. A quick 5-0 run to open the third quarter pushed Manhattan\u2019s advantage to its largest to that point at 16 points. The teams traded baskets through the rest of the period, but the Indians maintained control, leading 40-22 entering the final quarter.<\/p>\n
With a sizable cushion built through three periods of relentless defense, Manhattan closed things out in the fourth, eventually turning the final minutes over to its reserves after maintaining a double-digit lead.<\/p>\n
Manhattan\u2019s state tournament journey will begin Wednesday, with opponent and location still to be determined. KSHSAA adjusted its state-site format this season, giving higher seeds geographic preference among host cities. Matchups are expected to be announced on Monday.<\/p>\n
MANHATTAN 57,<\/p>\n
WICHITA EAST 48<\/p>\n
MHS (17-7) \u2014 11; 12; 17; 17; \u2014 57<\/p>\n
Wichita East (15-9) \u2014 7; 5; 10; 16; \u2014 48<\/p>\n
INDIVIDUAL SCORING<\/p>\n
MHS \u2014 Carpenter 15, Doering 13, Sawyer Newton 7, Witt 2, Washington 9, Hattrup 9, Duff 5<\/p>\n
Wichita East \u2014 Hunter 3, Henderson 19, Phillips Grey 10, Korir 6, Welch 8, Butler 2<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Manhattan High boys are headed back to state. The No. 4-seeded Indians took care of business on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":156552,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[4567,75,84,83,9,24,63,319],"class_list":["post-156551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-basketball","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156551"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156551\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/156552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}