Olivet Takes Game From Men's Basketball in Final Minute
Nov 16, 2018
DUBUQUE, Iowa – The University of Dubuque men’s basketball team suffered tough loss on Friday night as Olivet scored seven points in the final 70 seconds to beat the Spartans 84-77.
The Olivet Comets raced out to a quick 11-4 lead in the opening four minutes, putting the Spartans behind the eight ball. The Olivet lead would hang around seven points for the next six minutes until the Comets went on a quick spurt to put UD down 13 points at the midway point of the first half. Olivet got their biggest lead of the first half at 36-21 with 6:33 left in the half. UD finally found a grove and quickly cut the Olivet lead down to 38-31 at the five minute mark after back-to-back three pointers from Michael Williams and Mitch Burger.
In the final minute of the first half, Michael Williams sank two free throws before the Spartans got a stop, leading to a Cade Daughtery three before the buzzer to make it 45-43 heading into the break, the closest the Spartans had been since tip-off. In the up and down first half, eight different Spartans scored, led by Michael Williams with nine and Jason Barker with eight.
In the second half, Jason Barker converted a layup with 11:15 left to put the Spartans back within one point and forced Olivet to call a timeout to try to halt to Spartans momentum. However, not long after the timeout, Peter Ragen drilled a three to give the Spartans their first lead of the game at 60-58 with 10:28 remaining.
Trailing 71-68, UD used a quick 6-0 run behind five straight points from Marcus McDaniel and a free throw from Deonte Newsome to go up 74-71 with just over five minutes left. After a back and forth couple minutes and the score tied at 77 all, Olivet drilled a deep three pointer with 1:11 remaining to regain the lead. UD missed a game-tying three on the following possession and Olivet would go on to score the next four points on fast breaks to take the game from the Spartans.
Deonte Newsome, who had struggled scoring to start the season, finally broke out for a team-high 16 points on Friday night, doing most of the damage from the free throw line, making 10 of 14. Newsome also dished out a team-high six assists. In all, five Spartans scored in double figures against the Comets. Michael Williams finished with 14, Cade Daughtery had 11 and Peter Ragen and Michael Williams both dropped in 10.
After making six treys in the first half, UD made just three shots from beyond the arc in the second to finish nine of 31 from deep in the contest. The Spartans had dominated teams in the paint in previous games, but the Comets outscored them 44-26 in the paint.
The Spartans will play their second of two games at the Loras Tip-Off on Saturday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. against St. Scholastica.
