ANGOLA, Ind. – The Trine University men's basketball team was able to escape the MTI Center on Saturday afternoon unscathed after an upset bid by the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. The 19th-ranked Thunder were able to move to 7-0 with a 79-78 win against the visiting Pointers who are now 4-3 overall.
Trine led by 15 at one point in the second half, but UWSP was feisty and closed the gap throughout the period to tie the game up with less than three minutes remaining. The teams traded baskets until Cortez Garland found Grant Pahl on the wing for a three-point field goal with 35 seconds remaining to go up 79-76. After a pair of makes at the free throw line and a stop for the Pointers, the road team had an opportunity to take the lead in the final seconds. A defensive stand by the Thunder allowed them to sneak away with the win.
The shooting totals were fairly even in the game with both teams making around half of their shots taken. Trine was 30-for-59 (50.8%) while Stevens Point finished at 28-for-57 (49.1%). The Pointers were able to make the most of their offensive rebounds with an 18-6 difference in second chance opportunities, but the Thunder won the paint battle 40-36.
Aidan Smylie kicked off the game with a made three on the first possession to lead to his career-high 18 points. Fred Garland would insert energy into the arena with a made dunk coming off a steal early in the game. Both teams would settle in from there and grind out each possession. Neither team was able to take more than a two-possession lead before Trine knocked down back-to-back three-point field goals with just over five minutes to play in the first half.
It was Fred Garland and Smylie once again who were responsible for the baskets to give the Thunder a 27-19 advantage to lead to a timeout called by UWSP. The Pointers would cut the Trine lead down to 27-23 with less than four minutes to go in the half before a 6-0 run kept the Thunder in front and gave them their first double-digit lead of the contest at 33-23. Brent Cox and Cortez Garland were scorers late in the first half to take a 42-32 lead into the locker room.
Nate Tucker and Drew Moore chipped in on the Trine scoring in half number two to help further the lead by the nationally-ranked Thunder. A dunk by Cox gave the team their largest lead of the afternoon at 58-43 with 13:46 to play. Back-and-forth the two teams went before UWSP went on a 10-2 run to make it 64-57 just past the halfway mark in the second half.
And and-one by Cortez Garland coming out of a Pointer timeout was countered by a made three-point field goal as Stevens Point continued to close the gap. Late in the game, key stops as well as success from downtown got UWSP back to a tie game at 72 and led to the heroics by Pahl to secure the victory.
Four student-athletes finished in double figures, led by Smylie's 18. Fred Garland and Cortez Garland each had 15 points in the win as well as 11 points by Cox. Cox was the team leader with eight boards while Fred Garland distributed five of the team's 16 assists to pace the club.
After a nine day break, the Thunder will be back in action at Anderson University on Monday, December 18. That is a matinee contest beginning at 2 p.m.