ST. PETER, MINN. – The Gustavus Adolphus men’s basketball team will open its 2014-15 MIAC schedule on Wednesday against the University of St. Thomas on Gus Young Court at 7 p.m. Gustavus will enter conference play with a record of 3-1, while St. Thomas comes to town at 4-0 and ranked No. 5 in the nation.
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SCOUTING THE TOMMIES
After winning the 2013-14 regular season MIAC title for the ninth year in a row, the MIAC men’s basketball coaches voted that St. Thomas will complete a decade of dominance and claim its 10th-striaght MIAC title this season. The Tommies finished atop the 2014-15 MIAC Men’s Basketball Preseason Coaches’ Poll with eight of the 11 first-place votes. Head coach John Tauer’s team was 22-6 overall last year and 18-2 in league play to claim its ninth-straight championship, and the Tommies reached the MIAC Playoff championship game and received an at-large bid to the NCAA Division III Tournament. If the Tommies are to get title No. 10, they’ll rely on a trio of upperclassmen for both production and leaderhsip. The team graduated All-MIAC selections Zach Riedeman and Erik Tengwall, but welcome back senior All-MIAC center Conner Nord and senior guard Marcus Alipate, along with junior forward Taylor Montero. To this point, the Tommies have been led in scoring by sophomore guard Grant Shaeffer, who is averaging 19.3 points on 65-percent shooting in St. Thomas’s first four games. He also leads the team in assists with 4.2 per game. Nord is the Tommies’ leading rebounder to this point, and has pulled down 6.2 boards per game.
THE SERIES
Wednesday’s matchup marks the 184th meeting between Gustavus and St. Thomas in men’s basketball. The Tommies hold the advantage in the all-time series with a record of 110-73 and have won each of the previous five contests, including a 61-50 decision on Jan. 15 in St. Paul and a 73-68 loss on Feb. 20 in St. Peter.
LAST TIME OUT
Gustavus heads into tonight’s game after defeating Bethany Lutheran College 85-50 on Nov. 25 in St. Peter. The Gusties led 12-10 with 10:57 remaining in the first half and proceeded to go on runs of 13-0 and 14-6 that would put them in front 38-16 at the halfway mark. Gustavus would go on to outscore the Vikings 47-34 in the second half to take home the 85-40 victory. Gary Cooper (Jr., Detroit, Mich) put up 17 points to lead Gustavus in scoring, with Peter Kruize (So., St. Peter, Minn.) coming in with 12 and Sergio Najera (Jr., New Prague, Minn.) and Coleman Sweeney (So., Lake City, Minn.) tallying 10 apiece to help Gustavus shoot 61.9-percent from the floor. First-year Jacob Herd (Waconia, Minn.) also had a notable evening with six points, the first points of his career.
St. Thomas is most recently coming off a nail-biting 70-69 victory over UW-River Falls on Nov. 25 in St. Paul. Shaeffer scored a game-high 22 points and helped the Tommies use an 18-9 game-closing run in the final 7:00 to earn their fourth victory of the season. UW-River Falls shot 72 percent in the first half but still trailed St. Thomas 35-30 at halftime. The Falcons opened the second half with a 19-6 run and still led 60-52 with 5:51 to play, however, the Tommies answered with a 10-2 run, started by a Montero’s three-pointer and capped by Alipate’s three-point basket with 2:54 to play. Grant Erickson’s layup gave UW-River Falls its last lead at 64-62 before the Tommies went on an 8-2 run down the stretch, with six of those points scored by Shaeffer.