by Dax Larson
March 07, 2006
When the buzzer sounded, the longest minute of the Mavericks’ lives ended and the celebration began.
With a 78-69 win over St. Cloud State, the Minnesota State men’s basketball team was crowned Wells Fargo Finals champions for the first time in the six-year history of the tournament.
“It seemed like it lasted forever,” senior Chris Whitfield said. “This is an accumulation of four years of work.”
With MSU up 71-63 with 1:09 left in the game, the Mavs were having troubles getting the ball inbounds as St. Cloud was on a defensive frenzy to get steals. The Huskies needed a turnover or else they were forced to foul. SCSU got a steal with 11 seconds left, but it was too little too late.
After three timeouts and eight free-throw attempts the Mavericks were finally victorious. MSU hit 7-of-8 free throws in the final 1:03 of the game to seal the championship.
“We got in the bonus and double-bonus early and it enabled us to keep our lead,” head coach Matt Margenthaler said. “When you step up to the line and make free throws, that is how you win games.”
MSU overcame a 27-15 deficit in the first half to tie the game 33-33 going into halftime. MSU outscored SCSU 8-0 in the final three minutes of the half. Senior Rueben Trotter and junior Paris Kyles each had four of the eight points.
“Mankato beat us to the ball most of the time,” said SCSU head coach Kevin Schlagel. “Great players were making great plays.”
The second half started the same way the first ended. MSU went on a 10-1 run thanks to the Wells Fargo Finals Most Outstanding Player, junior Luke Anderson, who had eight points in the first three minutes of the half. Anderson hit the only two 3-pointers for MSU in that stretch.
“Once I got a good look, all I needed to do was knock it down and I did,” Anderson said. “I did what I needed to do.”
The Huskies pulled within five points of MSU on a couple different occasions, but MSU maintained a high level of energy which wore SCSU down. The Mavericks were able to overcome the deficit thanks to outrebounding the Huskies 41-27, limiting SCSU’s second-chance points to 11.
“We wanted to get rebounds and keep them to one shot and that is what we did,” Trotter said. “I just thank God we had Whitfield out there today. He did a great job.”
In a 77-71 win over University of Minnesota Duluth Saturday, Whitfield was limited to only eight minutes because of foul trouble. In the win over SCSU, Whitfield played 29 minutes with nine points and 10 rebounds. Whitfield has been with MSU all four years of his collegiate career and the win over SCSU was his last home game at Taylor Center.
“This was the ideal way to go out,” Whitfield said. “Of course, we have more basketball to play and hopefully we can accomplish even bigger things.”
Anderson had three points in the first half, but finished with a team-high 21 points. He added seven boards and went 7-for-8 from the free throw line. Kyles and Trotter were both named to the All-Wells Fargo Finals team. Kyles tied a season-high with 18 points and Trotter had 16 points on 7-9 shooting. MSU shot 50 percent in both wins and was 33-of-42 from the free-throw line.
Dax Larson is a Reporter staff writer
