Men's Basketball Takes on Southern Nazarene on Saturday in NCAA DII Central Region

Saturday, March 10

Maryville, Missouri

12 p.m.

St. Cloud State

Southern Nazarene University

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Southern Nazarene University

W, 81-68

Mar 10 (Sat)

12 p.m.

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Brindley Theisen

/ Men's Basketball

Andy Foley

Photo by: Paul Middlestaedt

Men's Basketball Takes on Southern Nazarene on Saturday in NCAA DII Central Region

3/7/2018 3:50:00 PM | Men's Basketball

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St. Cloud, Minn. – The St. Cloud State men's basketball team (23-8) will take on Southern Nazarene (27-2) in first round of the NCAA Division II Men's Basketball Central Region on Saturday, March 10, at 12 p.m. The Huskies earned an at-large berth and the sixth seed in the tournament. The Crimson Storm won their conference tournament for an automatic berth and are seeded third.

Scouting Southern Nazarene

The Crimson Storm have won six in a row and 23 of their last 24 games.
Southern Nazarene has already won a school record 27 games and were both the regular season and the conference tournament champions in the Great American Conference (GAC).
The program is being led by Jhonathan Dunn, who was named both the GAC Player of the Year and the Tournament MVP this season besides being a First Team All-GAC selection.
Dunn is averaging 18.9 points per game, while shooting 47.9 percent from the field, 41 percent from three-point range and 76.5 percent from the free throw line.
Micah Speight was a First Team All-GAC selection this season and also captured a spot on the league's All-Tournament Team.
Speight is averaging 16.5 points per game, while shooting 48.3 percent from the field, 43 percent from three-point range and 84.4 percent from the free throw line.
He also leads the team in steals with 63 and assists with 144.
Noah Starkey earned the Defensive Player of the Year honors in the conference this season.
He leads the team with 51 blocks.
Starkey is also averaging 13.2 pints per game, while shooting 53.4 percent from the field and 79.5 percent from the foul line.
Quaylon Newton is averaging 8.8 points per game, while shooting 57.1 percent from the field.
Zach Johnson is second on the team in steals with 48 this season despite coming off the bench.
SNU is averaging 77.5 points per game, while shooting 47.9 percent from the field, 39.2 percent from three-point range and 74.7 from the free throw line.
The program has scored 80 or more points in 14 games with a high of 91 against Arkansas Monticello and Southwestern Oklahoma.
SNU is coached by Adam Bohac, who is in his 10th year in charge of the program.

Prior Meetings

The SCSU program has never faced off with Southern Nazarene on the basketball floor.
The team has only faced one current team in the Great American Conference and that was when they were defeated by Ouachita Baptist by a 92-74 score in 1974-75.

Listen to The Games
The game will be aired live on Granite City Sports (1390 AM) with J.W. Cox on the call. All SCSU games can also be heard online at www.1390granitecitysports.com

The game can also be heard on the KVSC Sports Stream with Leif Ender and Will Heyer on the call.

Live Stats/ Live Video Anyone?
Live video for all the NCAA DII Central Region tournament games can be found at this link

The Northwest Missouri State in running live stats for each round of the NCAA DII Central Region here

Read This Week's Game Notes
A complete collection of interesting game notes, stats, rosters and records is available weekly in the SCSU Basketball Notes Package.

Notables

St. Cloud State earned an at-large berth for the Central Region of the NCAA DII Men's Basketball Championship.
It is the 14th time that SCSU has made the NCAA Tournament since 1973-74.
The program has an all-time record of 12-15 in NCAA Tournament games.
It is the first appearance for SCSU in the tournament since the 2011-12 campaign.
The program has won a game in the NCAA tournament in nine of the previous 13 visits.
The team is 4-4 this season against current teams in the Central Region (2-0 vs. Minnesota State, 1-0 vs. Missouri Southern, 0-2 vs. Southwest Minnesota State and 1-1 vs. Northern State.
The program enters the tournament having won 20 of the last 26 games.
The team lost in the semifinals of the NSIC/Sanford Health Tournament to Southwest Minnesota State by a 73-66 margin on Feb. 26.
Junior Gage Davis led the team in the game against the Mustangs with 20 points and eight rebounds.
It was his eighth game this season and 43rd game in his career that he has scored 20 or more points.
His eight rebounds led the team for the 13thh time this season and the 46th time in his career.
Senior Jon Averkamp chipped in with 15 points, three assists and two steals.
It was Averkamp's 26th game in double figures this season.
Junior Adam Heede-Andersen totaled five assists to led the team for the 10th time this season.
Junior Sean Smith had eight points and four blocks.
It was his 22nd game in double figures in blocks this season.
Junior Brindley Theisen recorded eight points against SMSU and had a pair of threes.
The team is 16-7 (.695 winning percentage) when Theisen can hit two or more threes in a game this year, but the team improves to 11-3 (.785 winning percentage) when he can get three or more threes in a contest in 2017-18.
The Huskies shot 50.9 percent from the field (27-for-53) compared to Southwest Minnesota State's 50.8 percent (30-for-59) in the semifinals.
It was only the second time that the program has lost a game in which it they shot a higher percentage than their opponent.
The team also picked up 16 assists compared to 13 for SMSU and it was the first time the program has lost a game this year when holding an assist lead.
The game was also only the fourth time this season that the program has lost when committing fewer turnovers.
It was only the 10th time that the program has not held a rebounding edge (4-6 record).
The loss dropped SCSU to 14-8 all-time in the NSIC Tournament and 47-43 all-time in post-season play.
The program has won 12 of its last 14 games and has four players averaging in double figures in that stretch with Davis leading the team in both scoring (18.9) and rebounding (7.9), while also shooting 48 percent from the field.
Six players on the have played in all 31 games this season with three (Averkamp, Theisen and Smith) starting all of them.
Senior Andy Foley has played in 123 career games and is one away from tying the school record for games played currently held by Brett Putz (2008-12).
Davis has moved into sixth all-time on the school's scoring list with 1,751 points.
The team's 17 league wins this season tied the school record set by the 2013-14 team.
The 23 wins on the campaign this year are the most since the 2009-10 team won 29 games and eighth time since the 2004-05 season that the program has won 20 or more games.

Up Next

If the Huskies defeat Southern Nazarene on Saturday, March 10, they will advance to the semifinal game of the NCAAA DII Central Region and will take on the winner of #2 seed Northern State and #7 seed Washburn on Sunday, March 11, at 5 p.m.
The program is 1-1 against Northern State this season and has a mark of 29-15 all-time against the Wolves since the first game of the series in 1959-60.
The team is 2-3 all-time against Washburn since the start of the series in 1962-63