OMAHA, Neb. - Concordia (Neb.) gave the Omaha Men's Basketball team all they could handle in the opening half Wednesday night.
But after trailing most of the first half, the Mavericks scored 10 straight early in the second half to take the lead for good and held the NAIA Bulldogs at bay the rest of the way for a 96-80 victory at Baxter Arena.
Ja'Sean Glover provided a spark Omaha needed off the bench, hitting three 3-pointers midway through the second half and finishing with a career-high 24 points.
He was one of four Mavs (2-3) in double figures as
Lance Waddles added 21 points and eight rebounds, and Kam Thomas and
Tony Osburn had 15 points each.
But the 16-point lead was Omaha's biggest lead of the night as Concordia hung around.
There were five lead changes and four ties in the game's first 11 minutes before Concordia held a lead for nearly the rest of the first half.
The Bulldogs (4-2) were up 37-30 with three minutes left before a 15-7 Omaha run put the Mavs in front at halftime.
A three-point play by
Valentino Simon with a minute left tied it before two Glover free throws with two seconds left gave the Mavs a 45-44 halftime lead.
Concordia led briefly in the second half when Dane Jacobsen hit back-to-back 3s for a 51-49 lead, but Omaha responded with its crucial 10-0 run on its next four possessions and never trailed again. Waddles hit a pair of 3s in transition to cap that burst.
Omaha took its first double-digit lead at 65-55 on a Glover trey with 12:25 left. Glover went on to hit three 3s in a four-minute span as the Mavs extended the lead to 80-65 with seven minutes left.
Concordia, though, wouldn't go away. Concordia cut Omaha's lead to 82-75, but a Kam Thomas 3 with 3:35 left kept the Bulldogs from getting any closer.
"I thought in the second half our defensive intensity picked up a lot," Omaha head coach
Chris Crutchfield said.
Omaha did a better job on the boards in the second half. Concordia was outrebounding Omaha 17-9 in the first 14 minutes, but the Mavs finished with a 32-30 edge on the glass.
Omaha, which played without starting guard
Grant Stubblefield, shot 53.8 percent from the field, including 59.4 percent after halftime.
The win was Omaha's 12th straight victory at Baxter, but the Mavs now play their next three away from home.
Next up for Omaha will be a Friday night game at LSU, which is 4-0 and is averaging 98.5 points per game.
LSU also features former Maverick
Marquel Sutton, who was last season's Summit League Player of the Year. Sutton is averaging 15.8 points and 9.8 rebounds and has three double-doubles in LSU's four games.
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