DE-FENSE!

The Tigers cruised past Briar Cliff in the semifinal, thanks largely in part to their defense. Coach Hemenway must have challenged them to get better defensively (which is good, cause they need to be consistent defensively to do anything in Branson), especially the guards, and they responded. DWU won 73-55 and held Briar Cliff's two best guys to 10 points for Chase Vanderfeen and Kyle Semprimi only scored 6. Both players came in averaging almost 15 points per game. Vanderfeen was the only Briar Cliff player in double digits. DWU's offense was very balanced in the contest being led by what has been come to be known as "The Big 3" in Brady Wiebe, Darrin Dorsey, and Preston Broughton. Preston had 19 on 7-8 shooting and 9 rebounds, Darrin had 16, and Brady had 14 points and 13 rebounds. Mitch Bain also had 12. Here are some other articles on the game.

DWU's article
Daily Republic's article
Briar Cliff's article

Well the win sets up the GPAC championship. And you couldn't have wrote the script any better if you were producing a movie. #1 seed, #2 seed. Bitter rivals, split the season series and get a rubber match in the conference championship game. That's right, USF is coming to the Corn Palace on Tuesday night for what could be the fullest Corn Palace, definitely the craziest, anybody has seen for one game between two teams in a very long time. I would not be surprised to see extra police force at the game tomorrow night. There are no words to describe this matchup or what the Corn Palace atmosphere will be like or feel like on Tuesday. Game is at 7 p.m. All I can say is... be there in blue and white.

Webcast of game - 7 p.m. - I'm pretty sure they are webcasting it, although not positive. You'll have to check it out around gametime.