 |
| Casey Noll |
Every win for the Miners this season as been one that has put a bad streak to an end -- and one that the Miners really wanted to rid themselves of was finally brushed aside Saturday afternoon.
Thanks to 51.8 percent shooting and five players scoring in double figures, the Miners knocked off Indianapolis 85-71 at the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building for their first Great Lakes Valley Conference victory. UMR had gone winless in league play last season and dropped its opener Thursday to Saint Joseph's before winning a game that it never trailed in Saturday.
After each team scored on its first possession, the Miners scored the next nine points and never looked back. Yamani Ball hit two free throws at the 15:31 mark to give UMR an 11-2 lead, then the Miners extended the lead to 15 by the 12:21 mark on a fast break layup by Justin Taylor.
UMR kept its lead in double figures in double figures for the balance of the half, going up by as many as 19 on a three-pointer by Ball with 2:29 to go in the half before the Greyhounds scored the final eight points to make it 41-30 at the end of the half.
Indianapolis got the lead inside of 10 on a basket by Braxton Mills just 10 seconds after the second half started, but the Miners rattled off 11 of the next 15 points to back up by 16. UMR's lead reached as far as 22 at 63-41 when Casey Noll scored inside with 12:12 to go and Indianapolis could only get as close as 11 after that.
Noll led the Miners in scoring with 19 points as he made six of his seven shots from the field and added eight rebounds. Tyrone Davidson recorded his second straight double-double with 18 points and 14 rebounds, while also blocking four shots for the second game in succession. UMR also got 18 points from Ball, 16 from Taylor and 10 from Joe Shardo.
The Miners, who had struggled from three-point range in their last three games, made eight-of-18 from behind the arc Saturday and also went 19-of-23 from the free throw line.
UIndy's DeAndre Brock led all scorers with 23 points, but the Greyhounds (1-2, 0-1 GLVC) made only 39.7 percent of their shots in the contest and were outrebounded by the Miners by a 40-32 margin.
The win also snapped a 28-game losing streak in conference play, as the Miners (4-3, 1-1 GLVC) had lost their last eight games as a member of the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association, all 19 games last season in league play and Thursday's GLVC opener.
The Miners will return to action Thursday with a 7:30 p.m. game in Kansas City, Mo., against Rockhurst.
Leave a comment