Feb. 25, 2006
Contact: Brian McCann
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- In a microcosm of the entire season, the Viking basketball team rallied from a double-figure second half deficit but couldn't hold on, falling 76-72 to UW-Green Bay on Saturday night in front of in the Wolstein Center.
Cleveland State led 70-69 with 1:52 left, but the Phoenix regained the lead for good on a pair of free throws from Josh Lawrence with 1:37 remaining.
The game was played in front of 4,210 fans, the largest crowd at a CSU game in the Wolstein Center in almost three seasons.
From there, Ryan Evanochko took over.
Evanochko scored five points -- all from the foul line -- in the final 1:02 to ice the game for the Phoenix. He hit a pair with 34 seconds left that extended the UWGB advantage to 74-70 and then put the contest away with two more charity tosses with four seconds left.
Ryan Tillema paced the Phoenix with 23 points while Lawrence and Mike Schachtner added 14 points each.
"Tonight was the story of our season," head coach Mike Garland said. "A series here or a series there and we win this game. Unfortunately, Green Bay played some excellent basketball and they hit the shots when it counted.
"I thought that we played extremely hard, but at this time of the year when everything is on the line, you have to play better. We've got to learn to make better decisions, especially in the final minutes."
Victor Morris led CSU with a career high 19 points while J'Nathan Bullock added a double-double with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Steve Gansey came off the bench to score a season-high 13 points while Carlos English added 10 points and nine assists before fouling out with 1:02 left.
Cleveland State trailed by as many as 11 (53-42 with 12:31 left) before mounting a comeback.
Trailing 57-47, the Vikings ran off six straight points, three coming on free throws by Bullock, to close to within 57-52.
The Phoenix extended the lead back to six (64-58) but CSU rallied with English and Gansey each hitting three-pointers. When Gansey scored on a layup following his own steal, CSU led, 66-65 with 3:44 left. It was the Vikings first lead since the 14:32 mark of the first half.
The Vikings would eventually lead 69-67 on a Bullock three-point play with 3:15 left. Bullock would later break a 69-69 tie by hitting one of two free throws with 1:52 left by the Vikings would not score again until Morris hit jumper ith one second left.
The Vikings will now open Horizon League Championship play on Tuesday night (March 1) at Detroit. CSU enters the tourney as the No. 8 seed and will face the fifth-seeded Titans beginning at 7:00 p.m. in Calihan Hall.
