The men’s basketball team finished out the 2018-19 regular season 18-10, with a conference record of 16-6. The team will face Lyon College on Thursday, Feb. 28 in the quarterfinal round of the American Midwest Conference tournament. Park is the second seed. The results of that game were not known at press time.

Back on Feb. 12, the Pirates hosted a conference game against Columbia College and earned another victory.

Coming from a win against Saint Louis College of Pharmacy just before, the Pirates entered the court with the same spirit and mentality as the last game. During the warm-up, Park’s point guard, Zach Rutland, received a ball as an award for scoring his 1,000th career point.

In the beginning of the first half the game was intense and both teams were making their shots. In the first 20 minutes, both teams were working well with their defenses, and none of them took a big advantage on the scoreboard. With this, the Pirates ended the first half just one point ahead their opponents, 25-24.

When the second half started, the home team came to the court with the same approach. With a very solid defense, Park gave no chance to Columbia to lead the game. The Pirates maintained their lead until the last second of the game and were able to get their 13th win in conference games, the second in a row.

After the game, Yansius Gonzalez, a senior forward, said that this big conference win helped to make the players feel more relaxed and can give the team confidence to move forward to the rest of the season.

“We will remain focused and ready to play our next game as it is also a big matchup,” Gonzales said. “I hope that we will win the conference and national tournament.”