No. 4 Northwestern State Fends Off No. 5 New Orleans, Advances to Semifinals
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KATY, Texas – Fourth seed Northwestern State truly needed every minute to hold off a spirited comeback attempt from fifth seed New Orleans to escape the Leonard E. Merrell Center with an 82-79 win in a Hercules Tires Southland Conference Men’s Basketball Tournament game on Thursday night.
The win earned Northwestern (11-17) a date against top seed Nicholls Thursday at 5 p.m. CT.
“We dug ourselves a big hole to start. Uncharacteristically slow start for our team,” said New Orleans coach Mark Slessinger, whose team missed 12 of their first 13 shots. “We hadn’t had a game like that since going back to November, but they continued to work.
“We just weren’t able to put together stops and baskets enough to take the lead and build a lead enough to win the game.”
The Privateers closed within 81-79 on a Kmani Doughty 3-pointer with 12.4 seconds left, and after Northwestern’s Brian White missed the second of two free throws, UNO had a chance to force overtime, but a wild sequence that was eventually reviewed on video showed that Doughty’s foot was out of bounds, allowing the Demons to run out the final 1.2 seconds.
Second team All-Southland guard Trenton Massner scored 20, including three treys early in the contest while adding five rebounds, three assists and a steal to lead Northwestern.
“In the end, when things got a little harried, and we didn’t make shots we needed to make and they were at the free throw line chipping away at it, we had enough in us to hold on to the win,” said Northwestern coach Mike McConathy.
The Demons also got a huge boost from center Larry Owens, who scored 13 points and pulled down seven rebounds in his return to the lineup.
“It felt good,” said Owens.
UNO appeared headed for a blowout, but the Privateers regained their balance after the initial rush from Northwestern. Trailing 19-7 with 9:33 left in the half, UNO put together a 17-10 run that closed the margin to 29-24 at the 4:43 mark.
The Privateers drew even closer on consecutive three-pointers from Carson and St. Hilaire, making it a 35-34 deficit in the final minute of the half before Carvell Teasett drilled a triple that gave the Demons much-needed breathing space at 38-34 going into intermission.
UNO completed its comeback at the 18:48 mark of the second half when Derek St. Hilaire’s layup gave the Privateers their first lead of the game at 40-39.
Shaking off the early second half rust, Northwestern regained the lead and led by as much as 50-43 with 15:20 left, but UNO closed the gap to 52-51 before consecutive baskets from Kendal Coleman and White (a three-pointer) put the Demons back in control at 57-51 with 11:56 remaining.
Despite shooting 66 percent from the field and attempting 18 free throws in the first 12 minutes of the second half, the Privateers continued to fall behind due to the Demons shooting 50 percent from the field while also taking more than twice as many shots (20-9 edge) as UNO. The combination translated into a 67-60 margin for Northwestern heading into the final eight minutes of play.
Trailing 72-62, UNO began one last push to cut into the deficit with consecutive layups from Damion Rosser, as the second team all-conference guard put the Privateers on his back for much of the night. Rosser finished with a game-high 28 points and added four rebounds, four assists and four steals.
“We had to stay together as a team,” Owens said of Northwestern’s ability to withstand the numerous runs by UNO. “We were breaking down, but one of us had to step up and say ‘we’re good.’ I say to them all the time, ‘don’t break down. Stay focused. We’re going to pull through.”
Northwestern State lost both regular season games to Nicholls. The Colonels gained a 76-66 win on January 13 on the road and captured an 87-71 home victory on March 1.