Jan. 9, 2011
Final Stats
Contact: Brian McCann
VALPARAISO, Indiana - Cleveland State ran into more problems during its Indiana trip as Valparaiso took advantage of some Viking foul trouble and used some hot second-half shooting to claim a 64-58 win over the CSU on Sunday afternoon in the Athletics-Recreation Center on the Valparaiso campus.
The Vikings lost back-to-back games for the first time this season to slip to 15-3 on the year and 4-2 in Horizon League play, good for fifth place. Valparaiso, who is now 12-5 overall, moves into a four-way tie for first place with Detroit, Wright State and Butler with a 4-1 league mark.
"We lost this one in the first half because of our foul trouble," CSU head coach Gary Waters said. "We were playing well and making them take some bad shots but the more the whistles blew, the more we had to go to our bench and they just didn't play well.
"We had a double figure lead in the first half but we weren't able to hold it because our bench didn't come through for us again tonight. We had four starters sitting for the last four minutes of the first half so instead of pushing our lead to something like 20 points, we let them come back to cut it to three.
"When Valpo got on a roll in the second half, it was too late," Waters added.
Trey Harmon led the Vikings with 20 points, scoring all of them in the second half after playing just four first half minutes because of foul trouble. Aaron Pogue added 12 points and seven rebounds, including 10 second half points, while Norris Cole scored a season-low 10 points.
Cory Johnson was the only Crusader in double figures with 20 points, 14 coming in the second half.
After the Vikings led 21-18 at the intermission, Valparaiso came out on fire, making 11 of their first 12 field goal attempts to open up a 42-36 lead with 12:50 left. The Vikings played well during the same stretch, going six-for-11 from the field to start the second half, but the hot shooting of the Crusaders was too much to overcome.
After Harmon scored inside to pull CSU to within 50-45 with 7:08 left, the Crusaders ran off 10 straight points to seemingly put the game away with a 60-45 advantage with just 4:35 left.
But the Vikings answered. Two straight Pogue three-point plays inside closed the deficit to 60-51 with 2:39 left and then a pair of free throws by both Cole and Harmon made it 60-55 with 1:49 left.
The Vikings continued to turn up the intensity, and the Crusaders began to buckle. Johnson missed a one-and-one with 1:25 left but a Cole three-pointer at the other end went in and out. Erik Buggs was fouled but missed the one-and-one as well.
CSU took advantage of the miss as Harmon scored inside to make it a 60-57 Valpo lead with 1:01 left.
Ryan Broekhoff however stopped the 12-0 Viking run when he knocked down a three-pointer from deep in the left corner with 31 seconds left and the Crusaders were able to close out the game.
"I have to give it to our guys that they didn't quit and fought back, but we dug ourselves too big of a hole," Waters said.
After shooting .259 in the first half (7-27), Valpo was 19-for-30 after the break (.633) to shoot .456 for the game (26-57). CSU shot .360 in the first half (9-25) and .375 for the game (21-56), but managed just three-for-16 shooting from three-point (.188) while Valpo was going six-for-11 in the second half (.545) and seven-for-22 for the game (.318).
One bright spot for CSU was on the glass where the Vikings had a 40-35 rebounding edge. Cole led the way for the second straight game with eight rebounds while Pogue added seven and Tim Kamczyc six.
Despite being whistled for 21 fouls in the game, it wasn't the free throws that came from them that hurt CSU as much as the minutes spent on the bench by the CSU starters as Valpo shot just five-for-14 from the line (.357) while CSU was 13-for-18 (.722).
The Vikings played solid defense in the opening stanza but foul-trouble hindered the CSU effort as the only starter who did not miss minutes with two fouls was Montgomery. Harmon played just four minutes, Aaron Pogue 10 and Tim Kamczyc 15 while Cole missed the final 3:39.
After Ryan Broekhoff gave Valpo a 3-0 lead with a long trey at the 19:01 mark, CSU answered with a pair of baskets inside by Montgomery sandwiched around a trey by Cole to take a 7-3 lead with 15:47 left.
The Crusaders would close to within 9-8 on a field goal by Michael Rogers with 13:02 left before CSU ran off 10 straight to open up a 19-8 advantage with 7:43 left. Four different players scored for the Vikings during the run with Montgomery leading the way with a pair of field goals.
Foul trouble took its toll ended the half on a 10-2 burst to close to within 21-18 at the intermission.
The Vikings will conclude this three-game Horizon League road trip when the Vikings travel to Youngstown State to take on the Penguins on Saturday, Jan. 15 beginning at 7:00 p.m. in the Beeghley Center on the YSU campus.
