WINONA, Minn. — There's something about playing St. Scholastica that brings out the best in the Saint Mary's University men's basketball team.
And the Cardinals' best did not bode well for the Saints — again.
Saint Mary's — which poured in a season-high 92 points in drubbing CSS 92-80 in the teams' first meeting on Dec. 6 — used the dead-eye 3-point shooting of
Owen Ziegler (Mount Horeb, Wis.) and the clutch free throw performance of
Cameron Mallory (Joliet, Ill.) to post its second straight win over the Saints, this time a 71-65 conference win at the Saint Mary's Gym.
Mallory finished with a game-high 25 points, just two shy of his career-high 27-point effort against Macalester on Jan. 6, and was a near-perfect 9 of 10 from the free throw line — all in the second half.
While Mallory was doing his damage from the charity stripe, Ziegler was dynamite from behind the arc, matching his season high with five triples en route to a 15-point night.
It was a one-two combination that not only completed the sweep of St. Scholastica, but also gave Saint Mary's its first two-game winning streak of the season.
But it wasn't easy.
Try as they might, neither team could take the lead and run away and hide through the game's first 20 minutes.
St. Scholastica knocked down a pair of 3-pointers to grab an early, five-point 10-5 lead, only to have Saint Mary's answer with some long-range bombs of their own — getting a pair of 3-pointers from
Owen Ziegler (Mount Horeb, Wis.) and 3s from
Jabari Sawyer (Chicago, Ill.) and
Khai Branham (Bemidji, Minn.) — to grab its biggest lead of the half, 30-25 with under four minutes to play.
The Saints delivered five unanswered points to knot the game at 30-30, but a Mallory highlight-reel bucket in the waning seconds gave SMU the two-point, 32-30 edge at the intermission.
The Cardinals came out of the halftime break with a jump in their step, scoring 17 of the first 25 points to take their biggest lead of the game, 49-38, with 11:55 to play in regulation.
St. Scholastica would not go away quietly, however, as the Saints cut the deficit to two, 57-55, on a Koy Nelson layup with just over six minutes on the clock — but they would get no closer, as Saint Mary's ended outscoring CSS 14-10 to seal that elusive second straight victory.
Along with the 25 points from Mallory and the 15 from Ziegler, SMU also got 10-rebound showings from
Bruce Lockwood (Shakopee, Minn.) and
Breyton Buysman (Inver Grove Heights, Minn.). As a team, Saint Mary's shot 41.7 percent from the field (25-for-60), with 10 3-pointers, and an 11-for-12 effort from the free throw line.
SMU held a 41-32 rebounding advantage, and forced the Saints into 12 turnovers.
The Cardinals (6-11 MIAC, 7-15 overall) hit the road on Wednesday, when they travel to Augsburg's Si Melby Hall for a 7 p.m. conference matchup against the Auggies.
