Carrying momentum from winning its last two games of the regular season, the Knoxville Boys Basketball Squad will try to do something the Panthers have not done since the 2016/2017 season, and that is win a postseason game. The Panthers drew the 5th seed in the class 3A substate and will travel to Newton on Monday for first round action. The two teams played a couple of weeks ago on a Saturday afternoon in Wells Fargo Arena and the Cardinal won that game 59-50. Knoxville and Coach Troy Pearson felt that was not the real Knoxville squad due to the Panthers being on their 4th game of the week that week and were for the most part running on empty. Pearson adds with nearly a week since their regular season finale, he feels his team will be ready to face a good Newton squad.

Pearson: “I think the kids know that when we played them up at Wells Fargo and after the first quarter we played them pretty even. We’ll get a good scouting report, and Monday will be a game of two well prepared teams, and we’ll see who’s better on that night.”

Monday’s winner will take on the survivor of the Winterset and Des Moines Hoover contest on Thursday. You can hear live coverage on 95.3 KNIA with the pregame starting at 6:40.