Archive for the ‘Men's Basketball’ Category

Missouri Western sent their seniors out with a win and three game winning streaks that was capped off with an 86-72 win against Southwest Baptist Saturday night.
SBU won the opening tip and quickly turned it into three points after a Western foul on a lay-up that dropped and a free throw that followed.

The lead wouldn’t last long, though. The crowd got behind the Griffons and helped them to take the lead at 9-6 early in the first half.

“The crowd’s energy was everything tonight,” senior Marcus Jones said. “If we had been on the road I don’t know that the outcome would have been the same.”

Brandon Beck dunks the ball after a fast break during Western’s game against the Southwest Baptist Bearcats. The Griffons won 86-72. Photo | Dave Hon

Southwest Baptist came out in the second half and quickly started to chip away at the Griffons lead and with just over three minutes into the second half, the lead had evaporated to just a single point.

Western quickly grabbed the momentum back when Brandon Beck stole a pass at half court and outran his defender down the court to throw down a dunk that brought the crowd to their feet. From that point forward, the Griffons wouldn’t give up the lead the rest of the game.

SBU played the statistics late in the first half as they started fouling the Griffon ball handlers in the backcourt with four minutes remaining in the game. Coming into the game the Griffons were only shooting 59 percent from the foul line as a team and were forced to try and win the game from the charity stripe.

Western would go on to hit 20 of 27 free throw attempts in the game and ice the game late in the second half.

“For a team shooting 59 percent from the free throw line, I was very happy with how well we closed out the game from the line,” head coach Tom Smith said.

Western will turn around and play the Bearcats again in the first round of the MIAA tournament and will look to do many things the same to get a first round win against SBU.

“We knew this was going to be a big game for seeding in the tournament and we want to wear the white jerseys against them when we play them again,” Martin Nolan said.

Western will be the fourth seed and Southwest Baptist will be the fifth seed when they meet in the first round of the tournament.

Western finishes the regular season 17-10 overall and 12-8 in the MIAA. They will play in a rematch with Southwest Baptist in the first round of the MIAA tournament March 5 at 2:15 p.m.

The Griffons hadn’t lost a home conference game, but the University of Nebraska-Omaha made sure that Western wouldn’t finish the season that way as they took down the Griffons 90-74.

Western took an early 6-0 lead in the game, but the Maverick’s Jeff Martin helped erase the lead as he hit three 3 point shots to score nine of the Mav’s first 12 points.

“We took that early punch from them and didn’t really get back to playing Griffon basketball after that,” said senior guard Marcus Rhodes.

Photo by MArty Ayers

At the 13:46 mark in the second half, James Bush was whistled for a technical foul and the Mavericks capitalized by hitting the two foul shots as well as hitting a three from the wing to cap off a 12-2 run by UNO.

Western would not go down without a fight, though. Midway through the second half, the Griffons went on an 11-0 run to cut the lead to 12, but that is as far as they would get.

The Griffons committed 15 turnovers in the game compared to Nebraska-Omaha’s seven. The Mavericks also shot 55 percent from three point range and over 50 percent from the field. The Griffons struggled from beyond the arc as well as from the field. Western finished just 7-22 from three point range.

The Griffons fall to 14-9 on the season and 9-7 in the MIAA.

“This game was pretty much a must win for us, now we need to come out and take care of business these last four games,” said senior forward Quentin Noblin.

Coming into the game the Mavericks and Griffons were ranked seventh and eighth, respectively, in the region. With the loss, the Griffons have their work cut out for them to earn a bid to the NCAA Division II tournament.

“We will have to come back and win at least three of our last four or else we are going to be out,” Coach Tom Smith said.
Western will have to bounce back at Truman State on Saturday, Feb. 20, in Kirksville, Mo.

The Griffons’ homesickness continued Saturday night in a 79-75 loss to the Missouri Southern Lions.
Western has struggled away from the Looney Fieldhouse this season and a combination of poor shooting and being out rebounded hurt the Griffons down the stretch in the second half.

It was a tale of two halves for Western. In the first half, shots were dropping from long range as they finished the half six of nine from behind the three point arc and also helped them to a 36-39 lead at halftime.

However, in the second half, the Griffons could not hit their three point shots and struggled from the foul line. Going just 1 of 10 on three point shots and 4 of 11 from the free throw line, the Griffons were not able to hold onto the lead and battled for much of the second half to stay close with the Lions.

“We were getting good looks at the basket, they just weren’t falling for us,” said senior forward, Quentin Noblin.

Despite all the missed shots, the Griffons continued to fight back as the cut Missouri Southern’s lead to two points on three different occasions in the second half. The last of which was with 28 seconds remaining. Western was forced to foul and the Lions made their free throws down the stretch to close out the game.

“I was very happy with the team’s effort to fight back even though a lot of our shots weren’t falling,” head coach Tom Smith said.

Martin Nolan falls away from the basket during the Men’s game against Washburn. This past Saturday, Western lost to Missouri Southern 79-74. Photo by Ryan Richardson

Western had four players score in double digits in the game, including Dominique Thuston’s team high 21 points followed by Marcus Rhodes with 18, James Bush with 16 and Noblin finishing with 12 points.

The Griffons will need to regroup quickly as they return home to take on the University of Nebraska-Omaha on Wednesday night.

“The UNO game is a must win for us if we want to keep our hopes up of making the tournament,” Noblin said.

Western drops to 9-6 in MIAA play and 14-8 overall and is currently ranked eighth in the regional polls. They will look to get key wins against UNO, Southwest Baptist and the University of Central Missouri to improve their regional standings.