BUTTE — The calendar turned to March on Sunday, and Rocky Mountain College guard Omari Nesbit hit a shot befitting the month's madness in the Frontier Conference men's basketball tournament at the Butte Civic Center.
With Nesbit's top-seeded Battlin' Bears trailing fifth-seeded Montana Tech 75-73 in the final seconds of the teams' semifinal meeting, Nesbit took the inbounds pass from under his own basket, took two dribbles, double clutched and heaved a 70-foot prayer over the outstretched arms of Tech's Hayden Diekhans. The game clock hit zero with the ball in the air, just before it banked off the backboard and through the hoop to give Rocky Mountain a stunning 76-75 win.
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Nesbit's shot was the punctuation on a scintillating semifinal between Tech, the conference's reigning four-time champion, and Rocky, the proverbial new kid on the block that has now won 17 consecutive games under first-year head coach Danny Neville. Neither the Bears nor the Orediggers led by more than six points in a back-and-forth game that featured 12 ties and 12 lead changes.
Nesbit scored a game-high 26 points on 11-of-21 shooting, including a 4-for-6 mark from 3-point range. Royce Robinson added 15 points for the Battlin' Bears and Jacob Bilodeau had 11.
Asher Williams led Tech with 21 points, Diekhans had 17 and Camdyn LaRance added 10. The Orediggers (22-8) now await their NAIA tournament fate, which will be announced when the bracket is released Thursday.
Rocky (27-3) will meet Montana State-Northern in the championship at 7:30 p.m. Monday after the Lights rallied in the second half to upset third-seeded Carroll College in the late semifinal.
Seventh-seeded MSU-Northern continued its Cinderella run — the Lights took down No. 2 seed Bellevue in the quarterfinal round — despite trailing by as many as 17 points in the first half. The Lights were behind 40-29 at halftime but chipped away at Carroll's lead in the second half, eventually getting back in front 62-61 with six minutes to play.
It was a back-and-forth affair from there, with the teams trading small leads. It was a one-possession game up until the final seconds when MSUN created the final four-point margin on a pair of Claysen Delp free throws.
Four Lights scored in double figures: Leon Sayers IV with 18 points, Luke Holecek with 16, Austin Ramos with 15 and Raefe McEnroe with 13.
Frontier Conference MVP Isaiah Crane led Carroll (20-9) with 20 points and nine rebounds. Nate Christy added 15 points for the Fighting Saints, Drew Jones scored 13, Isaac Round had 12 and Kellen Harrison added 10.
Having eliminated the Nos. 2 and 3 seeds from the postseason tournament, MSU-Northern (17-12) will next face No. 1-seeded Rocky Mountain College in the championship. The Lights last won the Frontier Conference postseason tournament in 2012, while Rocky's last tournament championship came in 2014.
