Men Undone in Overtime
March 5, 2008
Kendall Smith
The Bulldogs now 21-7 on the year were eliminated from the first round of the Lone Star Conference Tournament. SWOSU must now wait until Sunday to learn if its season will continue when the NCAA Division II National Championships filed is announced.
Nate Perry scored 25 points and Kendall Smith added 21 as the Bulldogs overcome an ugly start with some of its most inspired basketball of the season.
Perry’s basket with four second to play in regulation tied the game at 88-88 and completed a run in which SWOSU scored 31 points in the game’s final eight minutes.Just as SWOSU was gaining some momentum its players were being disqualified one-by-one with five personal fouls.
Abdullah Lawal
ACU, which was led by Dejan Sencanski with 24 points, improved to 21-7 on the season advances on to the tournament semifinals.
SWOSU found itself down 20-3 from the start and never could get closer than 11 points before ending the half down 47-32.
The second half was a complete reversal as the Bulldogs shot 72% making 18-of-25 field goal attempts. No one was hotter than Smith who tied a season high with seven three pointers in 11 attempts. His three brought SWOSU to within eight at 56-48 with 14:28 to mark.
Perry then took control and continually beat ACU down low. He ended up going to the line 15 times where he made 11 of them. SWOSU missed 10 free throws in 32 attempts to finish the game at 69%.
SWOSU did have chances getting its only lead in the second overtime when Hale made two free throws to put the Bulldogs up 96-94. He then was called for a foul in the backcourt and the complexion of the game changed with him and Perry both on the bench.
ACU outscored 14-2 down the stretch as an exhausted Bulldog team was unable to answer.