Russell-Tyler-Ruthton's Aiden Wichmann dribbles the ball up the court in the Knights' 61-57 win over Charry in the Class A semifinals at the Target Center Thursday afternoon.

MINNEAPOLIS — The Russell-Tyler-Ruthton boys basketball team punched its ticket to Saturday’s championship game against New Life Academy with a 61-57 win over No. 4 Cherry in the Target Center Friday afternoon.

RTR improves to a perfect 7-0 at the Target Center with the win.

“First of all, I would like to say how extremely proud I am of our team’s effort,” RTR head coach Daren Gravley said. “That was a good basketball team we beat today. That was a good quality high school basketball game, guys playing hard on both ends of the floor. We faced some adversity early in the second half and we settled down. I give credit to our seniors. We kept working on defense to get steps and were able to execute our offense plus convert free throws for the win.”

The opening moments of the first half saw the Knights on their heels as Isaac Asuma and Noah Asuma opened the game by hitting three consecutive 3-pointers to take an early lead.

The Knights were able to get into the lane but had trouble finishing early. However, as the game settled in, both teams would swap leads throughout the first half.

The Knights turned over the ball six times in the first 10 minutes of play. Aiden Wichmann paced the scoring for the Knights with 13 points in the first half and went on to finish with 23 points and 10 assists.

“It’s always go-time for me,” Wichmann said. “Sometimes we need a bucket and someone’s got to step up to do it. Sometimes it’s me, sometimes it’s Werkman, we all take turns doing that role. We all know our roles and that’s what makes us so good. We’re just a really good team that plays well together.”

At the end of the first half, Tucker Haroldson fouled Noah Asuma at the 3-point line with .2 seconds left. Noah hit one of three free throws to take a 27-24 lead into the locker room. Noah and Isaac Asuma each had 10 points at the break.

Cherry struggled from the free-throw line, shooting 4-12 from the charity stripe in the game.

The Tigers scored on each of their first two possessions after halftime to extend their lead to 7 points and prompt a Knights timeout.

“I told the guys to just take a breath and understand what they’re trying to do,” Gravley said. “We have to recognize what (Isaac) Asuma was doing. We have to get some help and go to a counter move. We responded very well.”

The Knights responded behind the play of Aiden Wichmann and got the ball inside.

Hayden Gravley and Drew Werkman scored back-to-back buckets and Wichmann knocked down a floater to tie the game at 40.

Isaac Asuma picked up his fourth foul midway through the half and has substituted out to avoid fouling out.

The Knights then went on a 7-0 run, prompting a Cherry timeout with 6:42 remaining in the half.

Isaac Asuma responded with 6 unanswered points to cut RTR’s lead to 1.

The Tigers fouled Wichmann with 81 seconds remaining and he hit both free throws to go up by 4 points. Wichmann hit two more free throws to go up by 5, but when RTR stopped Cherry on the next possession, they turned the ball over again.

Noah Asuma hit a 3-pointer and then the Knights ran 20 seconds off the clock before the Tigers committed a foul. Gravley knocked down both free throws to extend the lead to 4 points, 59-55. The Knights hit 13-14 free throws in the ballgame

Isaac Asuma scored on the next possession following a timeout, but it was too little, too late. The Knights inbounded the ball to Wichmann, who passed the ball up the court to Werkman for the final basket. Werkman finished the game with 16 points on 57% shooting from the field.

Despite getting outrebounded on the glass 33-18 and having more turnovers than the Tigers 16-14, the Knights still were victorious.

Isaac Asuma scored a team-high 21 points on 10-20 shooting. Noah Sundquist, who scored 30 points in Cherry’s quarterfinal win with only one missed shot, finished with 6 points and five fouls. Isaac Asuma is the No.2 ranked player in the state of Minnesota and has committed to play Division I basketball at the University of Minnesota next year.

Russell-Tyler-Ruthton (30-1) will play No. 2 New Life Academy for the Class A State championship Saturday at 11 a.m.