SACRAMENTO, Calif. - In the closing game of the Big Sky-Summit Challenge, the Mavericks had one of their most dominant games of the season as they led for almost the entire game and went up by as much as 25 in a 70-60 win over Sacramento State.
Omaha wraps up the challenge at 1-1 for the second straight year and moves to 4-7 on the season, while the Bobcats go 0-2 this week and fall to 2-7.
Leaders for Omaha
For the 10th time in his career,
Marquel Sutton scored at least 20 points in a game as he ended the day with 23 while shooting 9-for-17 (.529) from the field. He also led the team with eight rebounds. Meanwhile,
Tony Osburn also scored in double figures for the fifth time this year with 15.
JJ White, making his first start of the year, scored nine while leading the team with four assists.
Team Stats
The Mavericks outshot the Bobcats in every category today, finishing with a huge lead in field goal percentage at 45.0% (27-for-60) to 35.6% (16-for-45), along with superior marks in three-point percentage at 34.8% (8-for-23) to 30.8% (8-for-26) and in free throw percentage at 100% (8-for-8) to 76.9% (20-for-26).
Omaha was out-rebounded 35 to 29, but made up the difference with 12 steals to five.
Inside the First Half
For the fourth time this year, Osburn got Omaha started in the first with a three-pointer at 18:45 to give the Mavericks a 3-2 lead. White and Sutton got going early as well, with the former draining his first three at 16:51 before connecting with the latter a minute later on an alley-oop to make it 12-4.
The Hornets did manage to tie the game 12-12 with 11:27 to go after scoring eight unanswered. Both teams would trade leads over the next three minutes until a technical foul on Sacramento State's Emil Skytta marked a huge shift in the game. Osburn made both free throws at 8:35 to jump start what would be an 18-2 run that would last until 0:55.
Lance Waddles followed this up with his first three-pointer of the day, before Sutton scored 10 of the next 13 Omaha points.
With just six seconds left on the clock and Omaha leading 36-27, Sutton got the ball yet again and made the buzzer beater from under the net to put Omaha up by 11 at the half. Along with Osburn, Sutton and him scored 28 of Omaha's 38 first half points.
Inside the Second Half
After six straight points in the first two minutes, courtesy of Osburn and
Kamryn Thomas, Omaha quickly found itself with its largest lead of the day at 17 points. With 15 minutes remaining the Hornets seemed like they were starting to chip away at the deficit as they got within 12, only for the Mavericks to rattle off 13 straight points from 14:43-10:42 to make it 25-point game at 59-34.
Joshua Streit made a pair of layups for his first points of the game during the run.
At 7:40, Sutton went up and made the second-chance layup to give him 20 points on the day. With a win all but secured, Omaha's bench finished off the game as
Khamani Cooper and
Pablo Soumare came into the game, as did
Lincoln Palbicki and
Sebastian Perry for their career debuts. With 90 seconds remaining, Perry came in from the right side and made a layup for the first score of his career.
Game Notes
- With 22 points in the second half on Wednesday and 16 in the first half today, Sutton totaled 38 points in the span of 20 minutes.
- Sutton cleared 900 career points today and now sits at 915.
- With this win, Omaha, for the first time in six years, has won two road non-conference games (excluding neutral sites) in a season.
Up Next
Next week is the final non-conference road trip of the season as the Mavericks head east for a pair of games in Iowa. First up is Northern Iowa on Friday, December 13 at 7 p.m., followed by No. 6 Iowa State on Sunday the 15th at noon.
