For the first time since 2019, South will be heading to Wichita for the Kansas Class 6A state tournament

The Raiders topped Olathe South, 79-53, in its substate final on Friday night at South. SM South (21-1) clinched the No.1 seed and opens against Maize (16-6) on Wednesday in the quarterfinals at Koch Arena in Wichita.

“We’re just going go down there and have fun. We’re going play our game to win it all,” said junior Ben Allen. “It’s going be great competition and we have to go out there and play like we did today.”

The Raiders held a tight 30-24 halftime lead, but came out of the locker room with an 11-0 run to open the second half. The run fueled a 27-8 third period, as Allen scored 10 of his team-high 24 points in the quarter.

Sophomore Conor Kerrigan also went bonkers with 12 of his 20 points in the third period.

“We just knew that if we could just get a decent lead we could just keep pushing up, and we came out hot,” said head coach Brett McFall. “But most importantly we got four stops right away, which set the tone and then we just ran away in the third quarter”.

Nic Anderson tallied a game-high 28 points for Olathe South, which finished at 15-7 for the season.

The Raiders will seek their first state title since winning the Class 5A title in 2013.

Shawnee Mission South (79)
Gregory 5, Featherston 3, Allen 24, McKenna 6, Sautter 18, Kerrigan 20, Black 3

Olathe South (53)
Corrales 3, Chai 11, Anderson 28, Steinbacher 7, Marks 4

Three-pointers: Allen 3, Sautter 2, Gregory, Featherston, Black; Anderson, Corrales, Chai