Nov. 25, 2010
By: Robert Ivory
AKRON, Ohio- For the first 29 minutes of Wednesday night's contest against the Akron Zips at the John A. Rhodes Arena, Cleveland State guard Norris Cole scored just three points. In the last eleven minutes, Cole led the Vikings with 16 points and helped his team continue their perfect run with a 64-51 victory over their local rivals.
"It's a big victory," Waters said. "The big victory is about our guys going on the road and completing a task. Our goal this year was to be very successful on the road, so we have been really focused when we went on the road."
"It was all a defensive effort, that's all that I can say. If they can shoot a percentage offensively, their defense holds people at bay. That's what we have been working toward for a whole year to get to this point. I thought they could not score and when you could not score, it's hard to beat a team and they were at that point."
With the victory, Waters collects his 250th career win and it takes the Vikings to 6-0 on the year, the best start in school history.
Four Vikings scored in double figures, but Cole's effort in the final ten minutes was the difference in the game. Cole had six rebounds and three assists at the half, but almost had more fouls then points, scoring three and committing two fouls, when he hit a pair of free throws with 10:41 left in the game.
With those two free throws, Cole went on a 9-1 run to untie the game at 35, to give the Vikings an eight-point lead, 44-36 at the 7:59 mark.
"As the point guard, you have to let the game come to you," Cole said. "I let the game come to me and whatever is open, I take it."
Cole fished with 19 points, 7 rebounds, 7 assists, and went 10-11 from the field.
Trevon Harmon hit three of his four three pointers at pivotal times in the second half as he finished with 18 points (7-12 from the field and 4-7 from three point land), and four rebounds.
"I thought Tre Harmon had an outstanding game," Waters said."He hit the open shots and he literally took the point guard out of the game. He could not go anywhere."
Cleveland State did a terrific job keeping Akron's offensive from getting in a groove from the beginning. The Zips held an early lead, but CSU nodded the game up at 6. Both teams traded baskets until Harmon hit his first three to make it 17-10.
The defense showed up for Cleveland State, especially when the Vikings went on a stretch of 5:12 without a basket and were able to preserve their lead. During that time, CSU missed eight straight shots; until Jeremy Montgomery (12 points) collected a Harmon missed three and easily put the layup in.
Harmon led the Vikings at the half with 9 points (4-8) and a steal.
"I thought I had be to aggressive," Harmon said. "Jeremy Montgomery and I both make that sacrifice, that if somebody is not doing the right thing, we are going to pick it up. Coach has confidence in all of us."
For the half, Akron turned the ball over 11 times, but CSU was only able to get 11 points off them. The Vikings had 17 more shot attempts in the half than the Zips, but hit only four more shots and carried a 28-25 lead into the half.
As Harmon, Montgomery, and Tim Kamczyc (10 points, 5 rebounds) led the Vikings in the half, the team shot just 32.4%, as Cole went just 1-7 from the field, but grabbed two offensive rebounds.
"In the first half," Cole said. "Tre [Harmon] was hitting shots, Aaron [Pogue] was doing a little bit inside, and we were winning. It would have been selfish of me to be too upset if we were winning and were defending the heck out of them."
Montgomery led the charge to begin the second half as he continually troubled the Zips driving to the lane and making two beautiful left-handed scoop layups.
Zips big man Zeke Marshall (14 points) had a basket under the hoop on the next possession for Akron, as it was the first field goal in almost ten minutes of game clock for the home team.
Marshall had a quiet game as CSU's Joe Latas matched a career high in minutes (11), pulled two offensive rebounds and was the dominate force that the Vikings needed.
"I needed to get in there and put a body on [Marshall] and neutralize that threat," Latas said. "We know he is a big option for them inside and I tried to take him off his right best I could to keep him off the glass."
Marshall finished with just three rebounds.
Akron's top scorers, Marshall, Brett McClanahan, Nikola Cvetinovic, and Darryl Roberts were all held under their season averages. Marshall was the only Zip to end with double digits.
The Zips did take the lead with 13:28 to go on a Mike Bardo layup on an offensive rebound, to make it 33-32 and cap an 8-0 run.
That's when Harmon made his first big three.
Cole pushed down the court after an Akron miss, dished the ball to a waiting Harmon in the corner. Harmon took the ball, dribbled up the arc and buried the three.
"Coach has been telling me to get a lot of arc on my shot," Harmon said. "I have been getting in the gym and working on my shot."
That's when the 1-7 from the floor Cole turned his game up a notch. He drove to the hole, was hacked by the Akron defender, and hit two free throws.
"Those free throws were good to see and see shots go in," Cole said. "We knew offensively we were going to come through, we were defending and missing shots that we normal make. We kept the faith and we knew eventually shots were going to fall."
Cole then went on his tear and put the Vikings out of reach of Akron, as the Zips never got closer than six points.
The highlight of Cole's night came in the last few minutes. Kamczyc got a rebound off a Zips miss, passed to Montgomery, who dished it off the Cole. Cole went the length of the floor on the fast break and power dunked over the seven foot Marshall who was the only Zip able to retreat.
"One thing that we work on everyday is making layups and getting hit by the dummy pads," Cole said. "I was not too worried about him coming, but my focus was finish and finish as hard as I could."
The monster left-handed jam not only got him to the line on the Marshall foul (which he would hit), but it also sealed up the Viking win. Cole would hit four consecutive free throws in the final 49 seconds to give CSU the 64-51.
He now has hit 26 of 26 free throws in the final five minutes of the game this year.
"He has no fear," Waters said about Cole. "He has bought into the system and Norris is a winner. I think all teams look for that ultimate leader and that's what we have right now."
Akron falls to 2-2 on the year with the loss.
CSU returns home with their perfect record on the line. St. Bonaventure heads to the Wolstein Center for a Saturday night (Nov. 27) matchup with tip at 6:00 p.m. Monday night (Nov. 29) does not get any easier as the Vikings face a NCAA Tournament participant, Robert Morris also with a 6:00 p.m.
