Index of Sports Press Releases

Dec. 22, 2007

Nelson, Tigers shoot to tournament title
The Daily Republic

Scott Nelson

CHICAGO — Opportunity knocked for Scott Nelson, and he answered the door in a big way.

The junior forward, inserted into Dakota Wesleyan University’s starting lineup in place of injured Marcus Vontz, was red-hot on Friday with 25 points, including 7-for-8 shooting from beyond the three-point arc, to lead the Tigers to victory in the championship game of the St. Xavier University Midwest Tournament in Chicago.

“Scott, it was his best game in a Tiger uniform,” said DWU head coach John Hemenway. “Scott played well in the second half last night and he carried that over into tonight’s game. We wouldn’t have won the tournament if Scott had not played at the level he played at. That’s the strength of our team. When one guy is out, we have depth across the board.”

Tournament MVP Preston Broughton added 17 points and six rebounds as the Tigers (12-4) beat in-state and Great Plains Athletic Conference rival Mount Marty (5-10), 88-73, in an all-South Dakota title game in the Windy City. The Lancers played well early, building a 29-20 lead in the first half, but that’s when DWU took over.

Andrew Lasche converted a three-point play and Colby Fitzgerald drilled a three-pointer to force a Mount Marty timeout, but the stoppage of play didn’t slow the Tigers’ momentum. Nelson tied the game with a three, and Broughton and Ike Muoneke each scored underneath to put DWU up 33-29 and cap a game-changing 13-0 run. Nelson nailed a pair of three-point shots and Muoneke added a basket at the buzzer to keep the lead at four, 41-37, heading into halftime.

“We had a nice run there to end the first half,” Hemenway said. “Our guys are really playing well. We’re really excited — we’re starting to come together as a team.”

Broughton scored the Tigers’ first seven points of the second half to keep DWU in front, but Mount Marty hung tough until the 10-minute mark. Nelson split the Lancers’ defense for a dunk that put the Tigers up 10, 67-57, and Chase Walder and Nelson hit back-to-back threes a minute later to push the lead to 73-59. Mount Marty never got within 12 points the rest of the way, and Hemenway cleared his bench as DWU celebrated the tournament title.

“We’ve done a good job of coming out of the locker room and starting the second half fast,” Hemenway said. “We ran a couple sets to Preston; we were trying to get him involved. I think he just made up his mind that he was going to spark us and take over the game a little bit.

“The second half is when we really played well and we really turned it up. That was the difference.”

In addition to Nelson and Broughton, three other Tigers scored in double figures. Muoneke scored 15 points, Walder added 12 off the bench and Lasche scored 10 as DWU shot 60.4 percent from the floor and 61.1 percent on three-pointers in the win. The Tigers also shot 79.2 percent from the free-throw line, which helped seal the game down the stretch. Nelson added six rebounds and a pair of blocks to his stat line, and Lasche and Fitzgerald each dished out six assists.

“We need a lot of guys to play well, and with as well as we’re playing, it’s the whole lot of them,” Hemenway said. “We’re really playing well and the guys are unselfish. That makes them easy to coach and they really enjoy playing with each other.”

Justin Peters was 10-for-11 from the floor to lead Mount Marty with 20 points. Nathan Fischer scored 16 points, Pat Anderson added 14 and Chris Filsinger finished with 12 as the Lancers also shot better than 50 percent from the floor. However, they only managed 33.3 percent of their three-point attempts, which wasn’t enough to hang with the hot-shooting Tigers.

DWU will take a week off to rest up and enjoy the holiday season before returning to campus to start practice in preparation of the second-half of the GPAC schedule. The Tigers are finished in 2007, but will begin 2008 with a four-game home stand, all against league opponents. DWU resumes play against Midland Lutheran College on Friday, Jan. 4 at 8 p.m. at the Corn Palace.

“The break will be good,” Hemenway said. “We’ll rest up. Marcus can get more healed. Preston can always use a break with how physical he plays. We’ll just come back on Jan. 4 against Midland Lutheran and hopefully we’ll continue playing the way we’re playing.”

All-Tournament Team
Broughton averaged 16 points and 7.3 rebounds per game over the Tigers’ three wins to earn a spot on the All-Tournament Team, as well as MVP honors. Fitzgerald joined Broughton on the All-Tournament Team with an average of 16.3 points per game. Fitzgerald scored 24 and 20 points in DWU’s first two wins, although the Tigers’ coach felt several of his guys could’ve been honored for their contributions to the tournament title.

“Colby made All-Tournament and obviously Preston was the MVP, but that could’ve went a lot of different ways,” Hemenway said. “That could’ve went to Scott. Ike had a great tournament. Brady (Wiebe) was great at times. Chase gave us a nice lift in all three games. Even Andrew didn’t score a ton of points, but he’s playing very well.”

Also named to the honor squad was: Pat Anderson from Mount Marty, Alok Aiyar of St. Xavier, Tom Rad tke of Calumet, Nate Bojrab of St. Francis, Patrick Murray of Algoma, Brian Champine of Siena Heights and Adam Fahrenkrog of St. Ambrose.

Notes: In Friday’s other games at the tournament, Siena Height beat St. Ambrose for seventh place, 83-77; Algoma beat St. Francis for fifth place, 99-62; and St. Xavier beat Calument, 89-64, in the third-place game. …DWU senior Marcus Vontz returned to action after missing three-plus games with a foot injury. Vontz played six minutes off the bench and scored two points in his return. …Mount Marty and DWU will meet two more times this year in GPAC play, the first on Jan. 9 at the Corn Palace, and again on Jan. 26 in Yankton.