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Eagles Bow Out of
GLIAC Tourney at Tech |
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Another Tech-nically sound performance from a team that’s been High Tech all season. The Michigan Tech Huskies shot 51.5 percent from the field and held a 42-29 edge on the glass Saturday (Mar. 1) in Houghton, MI, where they knocked the Ashland University Eagles out of the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference basketball playoffs with a 91-75 triumph. Tech, ranked fourth in the nation, is the top seed in the eight-team conference tournament and is 26-2. The loss leaves Ashland at 16-11. This first round battle was a game of surges. The Eagles fared a little better than their first trip to Tech earlier this season when lost, 74-50. This time, Tech made a number of runs to try and put the game away and until midway through the second half, the Eagles answered each spurt with one of their own. The Huskies were in front, 20-11 with 14:32 left in the first half and in a position to run away and hide from the Eagles. AU regrouped and with 6:44 left before halftime, was down just two points, 29-27. Tech then went on an 11-0 run over the next 3:56 and led, 40-27 with 2:48 to go before halftime. Sophomore Josh Buettner, a 6-8, 230-pound forward, had four points in that run and sophomore guard Jason Marcotte buried a trey during the stretch. At halftime MTU led, 45-32. Tech kept its lead in double digits throughout the early going in the second half. Then, with 13 minutes left in the game, the Eagles started to make a move. A three-point field goal by senior forward Pat Rush brought the Eagles to within eight points, 58-50 with 13:31 to play. Another trey by senior guard Isaac Kincaid with 12:26 remaining reduced the Tech lead to 60-55. That was as close as the Eagles would get. Center J.T. Luginski, a 6-7, 228-pound senior, stepped outside and nailed a trey to make it 63-55 with 11:45 to go. AU senior swingman Tom Church answered with a layup with 11:14 left, but the Eagles didn’t score again until senior forward Justin Larrick canned a pair of free throws with 9:31 to play. At that point Tech led, 68-59. The last time the game was that close again was with 7:14 left. After that, the Huskies enjoyed a lead that bounced back and forth from 14 to 18 points. MTU senior forward Matt Cameron, the league’s player of the year in 2001-2002 and a good bet to cop the same honor this season, had 18 points and 15 rebounds. Luginski led the winners with 24 points and he pulled down six rebounds. Marcotte had 20 points, hitting six of nine tries from three-point range. Buettner came off the bench to get 19 points and six rebounds. Most of AU’s scoring came from the senior backcourt of Kincaid and Angelo Edwards. Kincaid led all players in the game with 25 points. Edwards contributed 17 points. Sophomore center Mike Campbell was limited to seven points and seven rebounds. He did have four steals and rejected four shots. Campbell was hurt by the limited minutes of Larrick. The power forward battled foul trouble all afternoon. He eventually fouled out of the contest and played just 20 minutes. Ashland shot 42.2 percent (27-64) from the field and hit 17 of 19 tries at the free throw line (89.5 percent). Tech turned the ball over 14 times and AU gave the ball away on 10 occasions. The GLIAC Final Four will be played next Friday-Saturday, Mar. 6-7, at Tech. The other first-round games had Hillsdale visiting Findlay, Wayne State going to Gannon and Grand Valley calling on Northern Michigan. This is Ashland’s second consecutive trip to the GLIAC tourney. A year ago, the Eagles lost in the first round to Northwood. |