Jeffersontown pulls off Sweet 16 upset, takes down top-ranked St. Xavier in first round

Coming into this week, most across the Bluegrass were gearing up for a championship showdown on Saturday between the state’s two highest-ranked teams all season long: No. 1 St. Xavier and No. 2 Great Crossing.

But the Jeffersontown Chargers, which have reached the state tournament three of the last four years, were having none of that.

In the opening round of the 2025 UK HealthCare Boys Basketball Sweet 16 on Wednesday afternoon in Rupp Arena, it was the underdog Jeffersontown that pulled off the massive upset with a 64-59 victory over the top-ranked St. Xavier Tigers. The Chargers, which came into this event a respectable 17th in the state by KSR’s pre-Sweet 16 rankings update, trailed by as many as 10 points in the third quarter before mounting a comeback down the stretch.

“I read the local paper, they was already talking about St. X and Great Crossing, how great of a championship game that would be. That’s so disrespectful to the guys I put on this stage,” Jeffersontown head coach Richard Duncan said postgame. “We put in a lot of work to get to this moment, and to have people already write us off like we don’t have a chance… For someone to write you off like that, that’s a slap in the face. So we took it personally.”

No. 17 Jeffersontown has pulled off the upset and cracked this bracket wide open.

No. 1 St. Xavier loses 64-59 in the first round.

Camron McDaniels finishes with 17 points for JTown, 14 coming after halftime. pic.twitter.com/IIb5MmKZOU

— Zack Geoghegan (@ZGeogheganKSR) March 26, 2025

Fans and supporters of Jeffersontown can thank senior Camron McDaniels for providing the game-deciding push. After a rough start to the game saw McDaniels miss 13 of his first 14 shots, he found his rhythm late. His 11-point fourth quarter, which featured a pair of and-one finishes with under 65 seconds left in regulation, lifted his squad to Friday’s quarterfinals.

“I wasn’t worried about it,” McDaniels said of his slow shooting start. “Because as a basketball player, you just got to move on to the next play, next play, next play. But I put my faith in my teammates, and they can hoop. So I knew they was going to get it done.”

McDaniels, who only appeared in nine games to finish the season after transferring back to Jeffersontown from Huntington Prep (WV), finished his afternoon with 17 points. That mark was tied for the game-high with a pair of his teammates. Junior Dayvonne Harrison and senior Prince Kahnplaye also contributed 17 points each for the Charges. Kahnplaye grabbed 10 rebounds while McDaniels hauled in nine.

Jeffersontown advances to Friday’s quarterfinal where they’ll play the winner of South Oldham and Danville Christian Academy. St. Xavier, which made it to the Sweet 16 for the first time since 1995, will head into the offseason.

For St. Xavier, this was the Tigers’ first loss to an in-state team all season long. Coming into the Sweet 16 with a record of 31-2, the lone defeats came against schools from Maryland and Texas. Head coach Kevin Klein brought a 20-game win streak into Rupp Arena with the help of a group of guys who played years of basketball together at St. Xavier.

“Everybody on the team, I look at as a brother to me.” St. Xavier senior Chance Dillingham, sitting next to teammates Graham Krezmien and Will Hanke, said postgame. “Every game, I’m not just playing for myself. I’m playing for all my teammates as well… I started out with these two. I’ve never missed a game with either one of them. We’ve fought since we were 14 years old. We fought together — blood, sweat, and tears.

“For the season to end this way, I hate that, but for it to end with my brothers — that’s just the way it had to go.”

GAME RECAP

St. Xavier opened the game on a quick 5-0 run, pumping plenty of energy into the massive student section turnout that made the drive to Lexington from Louisville. Jeffersontown proved quickly this wouldn’t be a cake walk though, responding with an 8-0 run to take the lead and put the pressure on the Tigers.

They handled it well though, countering with another 5-0 run to regain the advantage. St. Xavier held a 19-14 edge after the first quarter with Dillingham and Krezmien combining for 15 of those points. But Jeffersontown continued to throw punches right back. Midway through the second quarter, it was only a one-point lead for the Tigers, 25-24, before a 6-0 run from St. Xavier extended the lead once again.

At the half, St. X led 35-29. The Tigers controlled all the momentum to start the third quarter too. With 2:07 left in the period, St. Xavier led 44-34 for its first double-digit lead of the day. But that’s when the game began to shift in favor of Jeffersontown. A 5-0 run to end the third quarter made it just a five-point game going into the final eight minutes. Six straight points out of the break then gave the Chargers its first lead since early in the contest.

Craziness ensued from there. St. Xavier responded with a three-pointer as both sides started to swap the lead every possession down the floor. With 3:25 left in the game, the score was knotted at 52-52. Jeffersontown was able to go up by four points and looked to be one more good play away from icing the win with the lead growing to five points and just 65 seconds to go. But five straight points in 30 seconds for the Tigers brought us back to a tie ball game with 35 ticks on the clock.

McDaniels would close it out for Jeffersontown with his second and-one in the final minute, putting the Chargers up by three. St. Xavier failed to get off a potential game-tying shot, ultimately gifting McDaniels two free throws the other way to reach the final score of 64-59.