Jan. 26—MITCHELL — The scoring dried up in the second half on Sunday afternoon for the Dakota Wesleyan University men’s basketball team.
But with a lot of luck, as their coach put it, the Tigers managed to pull out a victory in the final minutes of its 58-54 win over Doane in a Great Plains Athletic Conference matchup at the Corn Palace.
After leading by 13 points with 16:02 remaining, the Tigers scored only 10 more points for the remainder of the game and shot 28% in the second half. Mitchell product Steele Morgan had two big field goals in the final six minutes of the game — DWU’s only points in that span — and Sam Aslesen converted a pair of free throws with 2 seconds remaining to seal the victory, the Tigers’ 15th of the season.
It was a season-low for points for DWU, which improved to 7-3 in home games.
“There was a lot of luck involved,” DWU coach Kevin Williamson said. “I’d rather be lucky than good. We just were not finishing shots and we became a little passive with the shots in the elbow area. We executed some of the gameplan stuff pretty well but as the game went on, we could not make shots when we could get them.”
The defining moment came when DWU had the ball under the basket with 13 seconds left with a three point lead. Tampa Scott IV was the inbound passer and DWU was able to free up Morgan on the opposite block under the basket and he was able to lay the ball in and draw the foul to put the blue Tigers up by five points. Morgan missed the ensuing free throw but it ended up being a decisive shot.
“He really executed it well and timed it and then slipped at the last second and got to the block and was wide open,” Williamson said. “I didn’t know it was going to work, but he executed it really well and he became wide open for doing it.”
DWU took early control of the game in the first half, using a 15-0 run over a span of 4 minutes and 46 seconds to build a 24-13 lead and eventually build a 14-point edge late in the first period at 36-22. But Doane closed the half to only trail by nine points at the break.
But in the second half, it was Dakota Wesleyan’s turn to go cold on offense, with an eight-minute drought without a made field goal before Ethan Determan’s corner 3-pointer snapped the scoring slide. DWU’s offense struggled again until Morgan converted a layup with 4:45 left that put DWU up 54-49. After a Doane layup, neither team scored again until Morgan’s layup in the final seconds.
DWU also had a 30-21 edge in rebounds, including 11 on the offensive end. Williamson said the goal was to have at least 10 offensive rebounds and he was pleased to see that.
“I felt like that was going to keep us in it and it really did,” Williamson said.
The game had a strange feel throughout, similar to the first meeting between the teams this season, when DWU won the first half 45-14 and cruised to an 82-41 win in Crete, Nebraska on Nov. 16, 2024. But Doane’s mixture of presses and zones slowed down DWU plenty and kept the visitors in the game.
DWU had 14 points from Aslesen, plus 13 points off the bench from Ethan Determan. Jakob Dobney, who became the 60th player in Dakota Wesleyan history to reach 1,000 career points in the first half, finished with 11 points. Morgan nearly had a double-double with eight points and nine rebounds.
Doane (9-12, 4-9 GPAC), which lost its third game in a row, picked up 15 points from Glavine McDonald and 13 points from Brady Timm and shot 51% from the field but shot only two free throws for the game and none in the second half.
DWU (15-6, 8-5 GPAC) plays its next two matchups on the road, beginning on Saturday, Feb. 1 at Midland in Fremont, Nebraska.
Dakota Wesleyan men 58, Doane 54
Doane (9-12, 4-9 GPAC): Brady Timm 6-12 0-0 13 Caleb Hrabik 2-6 0-0 4 Casen Chaney 4-8 0-0 9 Glavine McDonald 6-9 0-0 15 Jack Wilson 4-5 1-2 9 Shelton Crawford 1-3 0-0 2 Elson Blanding 0-3 0-0 0 Aadam Coulibaly 0-0 0-0 0 Kashwell Pugh 1-1 0-0 2 Totals 24-47 1-2 54
Dakota Wesleyan (15-6, 8-5 GPAC): Tampa Scott IV 2-10 0-0 5 Randy Rosenquist Jr. 0-1 0-0 0 Jacob Dobney 5-10 0-0 11 Samuel Aslesen 5-10 4-4 14 Blaze Lubbers 0-2 1-2 1 Anthony Riggans 2-3 0-0 6 Ethan Determan 4-8 2-3 13 Steele Morgan 4-5 0-1 8 Totals 22-49 7-10 58
Halftime: DWU 38-29. 3-point field goals: DU 5-21 (McDonald 3-6, Chaney 1-1, Timm 1-5, Blanding 0-3, Hrabik 0-3, Crawford 0-2, Wilson 0-1), DWU 7-20 (Determan 3-6, Riggans 2-3, Scott 1-3, Dobney 1-6, Scott 1-3, Lubbers 0-1, Rosenquist 0-1). Rebounds: DU 21 (Timm 6), DWU 30 (Morgan 9). Assists: DU 10 (Timm 3), DWU 14 (Rosenquist 5). Steals: DU 6 (Timm 2, McDonald 2), DWU 14 (Rosenquist 5, Scott 4). Blocks: DU 1 (Coulibaly), DWU 3 (Dobney 2). Total fouls: DU 12, DWU 10. Fouled out: Wilson (2nd, 4:16). Turnovers: DU 9, DWU 11.
