The Southwest Minnesota State men's basketball team outscored Minnesota State Moorhead 12-8 in the overtime period to overcome the Dragons on their home court 86-82 in Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference action on Saturday night.
The victory was the first overtime win for the Mustangs since their 89-86 2OT win over Concordia-St. Paul on Feb. 11, 2011.
SMSU (10-9, 7-5 NSIC) outscored MSU Moorhead (14-4, 8-4 NSIC) 12-8 in the overtime period. With 15 seconds left in the overtime period, Tramel Barnes connected on both free throws to seal the deal.
SMSU committed a season-low five turnovers in the contest with four coming in regulation and one in the overtime period.
With 37 seconds remaining in the first half, Anthony Tucker drained a 3-pointer to push MSU Moorhead up 39-31 - its largest lead of the game.
The Mustangs would respond out of the break by reclaiming the lead at the 15:10 mark of the second half as a Shaun Condon 3-pointer capped a Mustang 9-0 run. From that point on, the Mustangs would never surrender the lead for the remainder of the game. MSUM managed to tie the game seven times down the stretch including the tie at the end of regulation that sent the game into overtime.
Tramel Barnes hit a jumper to put SMSU up 68-63 with 5:33 remaining but the Dragons would cut the lead to one, 68-67, with two Anthony Tucker free throws just minutes later. After Barnes hit another jumper at the 3:43 mark, Tucker responded again - this time with one of his five 3-pointers in the game. Tucker's 3-pointer would tie the game at 68-68 with three minutes remaining.
Jordan Miller and Lavione West would hook-up on an alley-oop dunk less than a minute later to put SMSU up two. Down one with 58 seconds left, MSUM managed one of its 18 offensive rebounds off a missed Eric Olson free throw but Anthony Tucker dribbled the ball of his foot and turned the ball over to SMSU. MSUM was forced to foul and Tramel Barnes drained the free throws to put SMSU up 74-71 with 20 seconds left. Out of a timeout and down by three, MSUM's Tyler Vaughn drained a deep 3-pointer with just six seconds left to tie the game up for the tenth time. The 3-pointer from Vaughn would send the game into overtime as Tramel Barnes could not connect on a jumper as time expired in regulation.
SMSU would convert on 5 of 7 possesions in the overtime to outscore MSU Moorhead 12-8. Tramel Barnes came up big again having two steals in overtime and connecting on two more free throws with 15 seconds left to put SMSU up for good, 86-82.
Nick Smith led the way for the Mustangs with his 18 points, while Tramel Barnes scored a season-high 14 points in the win. Matt Zager also had 14 points while William Giddings (12) and Jordan Miller (11) rounded out double-digit scoring for SMSU.
Anthony Tucker led all scorers with 30 points and Alex Novak collected a double-double (12 pts, 11 reb) for MSU Moorhead in the loss.
It was the tenth game in which the Mustangs finished a game shooting 50 percent or better from the floor and eigth of their last eleven games.
Courtesy: Adam Henning, Assistant Athletic Communications Director, Southwest Minnesota State University
