Veritas, sans Randtke, falls to Olathe Christian

Veritas Christian coach Doug Bennett wasn’t too angry after his team lost, 64-58, Tuesday night to Olathe Christian at Haskell Indian Nations University’s tiny Tecumseh Gym.

After all, Bennett’s squad played without its top scorer and rebounder against the Warriors — a squad that had defeated them by 20 points earlier this season — because 6-foot-5 Mark Randtke missed the game because of an injury.

“I’m really proud of the way we played without Mark,” Bennett said. “They all battled until the very, very end.”

Being on the opposite side of the score bothered Veritas’ Michael Kay, though.

“We should have won that game,” said Kay, who scored 14 of his game-high 18 points in the first half. “Our offense was really going in the first half, but in the third and fourth quarters we kind of got out of it.”

And a couple of possessions was all it took for the Warriors to erase a five-point deficit in the fourth quarter.

Olathe Christian’s Ben West and Riley Beets, who scored a team-high 16 points, drained back-to-back three-pointers with 7:11 to go that gave the Warriors the lead for good.

Veritas (5-12) became so flustered by the comeback it went three minutes without a point.

“I really think that their quick comeback stung us, and definitely took us out of our offense for a couple of possessions,” Bennett said.

“Everybody wanted to score, but no one was creating enough space in the structure of our offense. And that was the thing that allowed us to score in the first half.”

Veritas made a last-ditch effort. With 1:42 left, Kirk Long, who scored 15 points, had the chance to tie the game with a pair of free throws.

Long made one to cut the score to 56-55, but the Warriors closed the game with eight free throws.