ST. LOUIS – For the first time in 18 years, the Missouri Baptist University Men's Basketball team has claimed back-to-back regular season American Midwest Conference titles. The Spartans did so tonight with an 81-71 win over Harris-Stowe State University before a loud crowd at the Petty SRC at MBU.
The early part of the game was close as both teams came out with a lot of intensity but not a ton of scoring. When guard Joell Davis hit a free throw with 14:37 left in the first half, the Hornets took what would be their only lead of the game at 8-7. The Spartans would go on a 18-3 run over the next five minutes and thirty seconds to grab command of the game. Which is not to say the Hornets would go away easy. HSSU trimmed what was a 16-point cushion for the Spartans down to one with just over two minutes remaining in the half. MBU would have an answer though and enjoyed a 38-33 lead at halftime.
The first four minutes of the second half turned out to be the deciding stretch in the game. MBU came out of the locker room with a 14-2 run to give themselves a 52-35 lead with 16 minutes remaining. That lead would grow to as many as 20 before the Hornets would trim it below double-digits with just over three minutes remaining, 74-65. MBU was able to hold HSSU at bay though and won the game by 10, 81-71
Sophomore
Nico Hill continued his late season surge by leading the Spartans in scoring. The native of New Zealand scored a career-high 18 points. Hill was a perfect five of five from behind the arc in the first half.
The Spartan crowd recognized five seniors before the game with each of them playing in their final regular season game in the Petty SRC.
Tyrell Andrews,
Bastien Page,
Daishaun Woods,
Jadis White, and
Brendon Hardy all were honored before the tip-off. True to form, the seniors came up big when called upon. Hardy had 11 of his 15 points in the pivotal second half. Andrews had 10 of his 14 points after halftime as well. White was also in double figures with 11 points.
The Spartans shot a scorching 55% (27 of 49) from the field including 44% (10 of 23) from behind the arc. They also hit 17 of 24 free throws.
The Hornets ability to rebound, especially on the offensive end, is what kept them in the game throughout. HSSU owned a 40-29 overall advantage with 21 of those rebounds coming on the offensive end.
For the Hornets, Alex Nunnally finished with 22 points, eight rebounds and three steals. Antwan Campbell had a double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds. Patrick Evans chipped in with 16 points for the Hornets. As a team, HSSU was dismal from behind the arc, hitting only five of 25 attempts, including one of 13 in the first half.
The Spartans moved to 16-12 overall on the season and finished the regular season 12-4 in the AMC. Harris-Stowe is now 8-14 overall and 7-8 in conference play. The win keeps the Spartans in first place in the conference, with Columbia College just one victory behind. The Columbia Cougars finish out their regular season with a game against Hannibal-LaGrange University on Saturday. An HGLU victory would give the Spartans an outright conference championship and the top seed in next week's conference tournament. If the Cougars win on Saturday, the Spartans and Columbia would share the regular season conference championship title and the Cougars would get the top spot in the AMC tournament by way of a tie-breaker with the Spartans getting the second seed.
The last time the Spartans won back-to-back titles was the 2003-04 team that went 10-2 in conference, and the 2004-05 squad who finished 11-1 in the AMC. As fate would have it, the 2003-04 team shared the title with Columbia. MBU won the title outright a year ago by finishing 15-1.
MBU will watch the other conference action intently on Saturday. Regardless of results they will host at least one more home game this season in the first round of the AMC Conference Tournament. Next Thursday night at 7:00 p.m. MBU will host either the seventh seed UHSP Eutectics or the eighth seeded Lyon College Scots.
