ST. PAUL, Minn. — It was a classic David vs. Goliath showdown Monday evening at Concordia University's Gangelhoff Center.
St. Thomas, with its gaudy 31-game Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference win streak, No. 5 national ranking and near-perfect 10-1 overall record, was perfectly suited for the role of Goliath, while the Saint Mary's University men's basketball team was a fitting David.
And through the game's first 35 minutes, the Cardinals' slingshot was fully loaded and battering holes in the mighty Tommies' armor. Over those final five minutes, however, SMU's arsenal ran out of ammunition, as St. Thomas outscored the Cardinals 14-7 down the stretch, turning a two-point game into a 77-68 UST victory.
The Cardinals gave the Tommies all they could handle right from the opening tip. After UST opened with a quick eight-point, 10-2 lead in the game's first five minutes, SMU would score 13 of the next 18 points to tie the game 15-15 with 12:03 remaining. A 3-pointer by
Pat Freeman (Champlin, Minn.) gave SMU a 21-18 advantage, but the Tommies closed the half on a 19-14 run to take a slim, 37-35 lead into the locker room at the break.
It was more of the same in the second half, as the Tommies clung to a two-point, 63-61 edge following a
Will Wright (Chicago, Ill.) basket with 5:28 on the clock. That, however, would be as close as SMU would get, as the Cardinals managed just seven points over the final five minutes.
Wright scored a game-high 16 points and led four Cardinal player sin double figures. Freeman chipped in 15 points, while
Chris Palmer (Faribault, Minn.) notched his second collegiate double-double with 13 points and 11 rebounds, and
Thomas Sims (Eagan, Minn.) tallied 12 points.
Tyler Nicolai equaled Wright with a game-high 16 points to lead the way for the Tommies, who also got 13 points from Joe Scott and 11 from Alex Healy.
The Cardinals — who knocked down a season-best 10 3-pointers, were a perfect 18-for-18 from the free throw line and shot 41 percent from the field (20-for-48) — return to action on Wednesday, traveling to Northfield, Minn., for a 7 p.m. conference contest against St. Olaf.
