Aaron Walling / Sun Star
The Nanooks men’s basketball squad brought out the fire power in a back-and-forth matchup with the Saints of Saint Martin’s after laying a dud against Seattle Pacific. This win over the Saints has put the Nanooks in a tie for fourth in the standings of the Great Northwest Athletic Conference with Western Washington.
Before you get to the good, you must experience the bad. And the Nanooks went through it after a disastrous game against Seattle Pacific Falcons, where they shot only 38 percent from the field. The Falcons dominated the Nanooks in facet of the game, from offense to defense, the Nanooks had no answer to them.
“We really dug ourselves a hole in the first half,” Head Coach Mick Durham said after the game. “We just weren’t very good, but give [Seattle Pacific] credit. They shot it extremely well during the first half. Second half was more of ourselves. We are going to stay positive, and focus on the second half and build off of that. We ran into a team we beat last time on their home court, and they were determined to get us back, and they did.”
With that, the Nanooks turned in one of their best team performances of the season against the Saints, shooting 49 percent from the field and dropping 17 assists. The Nanooks came out to play in an 85-77 win to put them to 14-6 overall record on the year. They had three players score over 10 points, and with seniors Travante Williams and Almir Hadzisehovic scoring over 20 points each, the Nanooks were efficient on offense.
“That was a good win for us, I knew it wasn’t going to be easy and it wasn’t,” Durham said. “We got some separation from them in the second half, but they are a dangerous team that can shoot the three, and they kept coming back. It was good for us to get this win, especially after playing Western Oregon and Seattle Pacific in back-to-back games. This will be good for us as we move onto our four-game road trip.”
The second half was important, but it was the buzzer beater three from Zach Pederson for the Nanooks was the important play to the game at the end of the first half to put them up 43-40 at halftime. This gave them the needed momentum to take the game into the second half and dominate the Saints.