BIG SKY CONFERENCE & ATHLETIC DEPARTMENT PRESS RELEASES
Southern Utah and Eastern Washington moved to 2-0 in league play inThursday’s Big Sky Conference men’s basketball action. Despite Tyler Hall’s 33 points, Eastern Washington moved to 8-0 at home. Montana dictated the tempo in a win at Idaho. North Dakota won its second straight league game.
Southern Utah 78, Northern Colorado 76 – Randy Onuwasor’s jumper with two seconds left sealed the 78-76 road victory for SUU (4-11, 2-0 BSC). Onuwasor finished the game with 32 points on 13-of-22 from the floor and 5-of-7 from the charity stripe. He added a team-high eight rebounds. James McGee added 10 points for the Thunderbirds.
Northern Colorado (6-8, 2-1 BSC) was led by Jordan Davis with 29 points on 41 percent shooting. Davis also dished six assists and pulled down six boards.
“We had a great team win with a lot of effort tonight. We weren’t always on offensively and calls didn’t always go our way, but we had a ‘next play’ mentality,” Onwuasor said. “Player of the game was definitely Matt Johnson. He hit some big time shots for us.”
Senior John Marshall led the Thunderbirds in steals and assists with five each.
“Extremely proud of our guys for winning a big one on the road against a tough Northern Colorado team,” head coach Todd Simon said. “The guys executed offensively, trusted each other, and made winning plays down the stretch.”
Southern Utah opened the game with an 8-3 lead before a 22-6 Bear rally put Northern Colorado ahead, 25-14. The Thunderbirds fought from behind to knot the game at 25-25 before the Bears pulled ahead for a tight 41-39 lead at halftime.
The Bears launched the second half by extending their lead to 49-39 before a Thunderbird scoring spree, which was topped off by a McGee three and back-to-back Onwuasor buckets, tied the game at 54-54.
The battle knotted again at 57, 59, and 70 before the Bears spread their lead to 76-73 lead with under a minute to play. Johnson hit a clutch three with :46 to play, tying the game at 76’s before a defensive stop and an Onwuasor jumper with just two seconds to play closed the game for a Thunderbird win at 78-76.
“Randy Onwuasor made a huge game winner and Matt Johnson stepped in and had 12 big points,” Simon said. “We are excited about two big road wins to begin league play.”
The Thunderbirds continue Big Sky play on the road as they take on North Dakota on Saturday at 3 p.m.
North Dakota 68, Northern Arizona 63 (clink on score line for full box score) – UND senior Quinton Hooker led the Fighting Hawks to their second straight Big Sky win with 20 points. Sophomore forward Conner Avants pitched in 17 points with nine rebounds for the Fighting Hawks (7-6, 2-1 BSC).
NAU’s sophomore Marcus DeBerry tied his career-high with 19 points on 7-of-12 shooting with a career-best five 3-pointers. UND won the battle of the boards with 35 rebounds to NAU’s 30.
After UND took a 33-26 lead into the break thanks to a 10-point half from Avants, DeBerry sparked an early rally that saw NAU take its first lead of the game. He capped an 11-4 run to open the stanza with his second trey of that stretch to put the Lumberjacks ahead 39-37 at the12:39 mark.
UND answered and regained control with a 9-0 run sparked by freshman Billy Brown. Coming in for his first action of the game, the Spirit Lake, Iowa, native buried a 3-pointer to tie the game at 44-44. His teammates would extend the advantage to 50-44 with just over seven minutes to play.
Over the next five minutes, Hooker and Avants would team up for a 7-2 run that had the home ahead 60-52 with just over2:20 to play.
DeBerry and company would not go away as the slender sophomore banked home his third trey of the game with 42 ticks remaining to make it a 65-63 contest. NAU elected to play defense, but a foul late in the shot clock put Geno Crandall on the line for the double-bonus.
UND’s sophomore calmly sank both after going just 2-for-5 from the stripe before that. NAU had a pair of looks from beyond the arc on its next possession, but came up empty and Hooker provided the five-point margin with a free throw in the waning seconds.
That freebie gave Hooker his fifth 20-plus point scoring game of the season and 25th of his career. Senior Corey Baldwin added 10 points and came up with a big steal in the final two minutes that help stall the Lumberjacks’ rally.
Both teams shot 40 percent from the floor in the contest with NAU going 9-for-23 from deep, while UND connected on just 5-of-17 from beyond the arc.
The Fighting Hawks wrap up their first Big Sky home stand on Saturday with a tilt against Southern Utah at 4:05 p.m. CT.
