ST. CLOUD, Minn. -- St. Cloud State's long-range shooting the second half was too much for the Mavericks to overcome Thursday night and the Huskies protected their first-place lead with an 83-64 North Central Conference win at Halenbeck Hall.
The Huskies connected on eight of 10 shots from behind the arc the second half, snuffing out a Maverick rally in the process, to improve to 16-7 and 7-2. It was UNO's fourth-straight loss, dropping it to 13-13 and 2-6.
"I'll give them (St. Cloud State) credit. When we made some changes, they read them well and knocked down the shots when they needed to," UNO coach
Derrin Hansen said.
The Mavericks came out strong and came from five points down to take the lead, 23-22, with just under six minutes left in the first half as
Michael Jenkins hit back-to-back threes for his only field goals of the game.
The Huskies reclaimed the lead as David Dreas, who scored 36 points in St. Cloud State's overtime win in Omaha last week, hit eight straight points. The Huskies led, 37-31, at the half.
St. Cloud State scored the first four points of the second half and went on to forge a 56-41 lead with 14:26 to play before the Mavericks staged a rally.
Ryan Curtis and
Gabe Zwiener hit shots in traffic in the paint and
Zac Robinson followed with the second of his three second-half three-pointers to slice the deficit to 56-48 with 13 minutes left.
The Huskies' coach, Kevin Schlagel, called a timeout and SCSU answered with a three-pointer by Adam Sullivan and a jumper by Eric Greene 21 seconds later and the lead stayed in double digits the rest of the way.
"We had to gamble and take some chances," Hansen said. "When we did, they hit the shots."
Sullivan hit five threes the second half and finished with 17 points. Dreas led the Huskies with 24 points, hitting four of six from behind the arc. Matt Siegel added 20 points and Greene 12.
Curtis finished with 13 points to lead UNO and became the 27th Mav to go over 1,000 points. The senior from Omaha now has 1,005 for his career. He also had six rebounds.
Chris DeSpain added 11 points and
Denny Johnston 10, while Robinson finished with 9.
UNO will be back in NCC play on Saturday afternoon at Minnesota State, Mankato.
