Storm Men Snap Skid with Dominant Win at OBU

SHAWNEE, Okla. – A smothering second half defensive effort helped Southeastern snap its Great American Conference losing skid with a dominant 63-35 win over Oklahoma Baptist on Thursday night in Shawnee, Okla.
 
The win lifts the Savage Storm to 5-8 on the season overall and 1-6 in GAC play heading into a Saturday afternoon matchup with Northwestern Oklahoma State at 3 p.m. in Bloomer Sullivan Arena.
 
 
After fighting to a 27-23 lead at the half, the SE defense outscored the home team by 24 points in the second frame, finishing it off 36-12 en route to holding OBU to the league's lowest scoring performance of the season with 35 total points.
 
Jett Jobe and Gianpalo Riccio posted matching 13 point efforts with also matching 3-of-4 shooting efforts from behind the arc.
 
Kevin Buckingham joined them in double-digits with 10 points, while Tyler Lonzie and Bobby Johnson added eight each with Nathan Jackson turning in seven.
 
The Storm shot 46.4 percent overall for the game and 46.7 percent from long range, turning in a 50 percent effort from the floor in the first half while posting a 58.3 percent outing from behind the arc in the second half.
 
Jobe dished out a game-high five assists and the Storm finished with 15 on the night.
 
SE held a 43-to-31 edge in rebounding as a team, led by eight from Jackson while six others had three or more in the contest.
 
The lead changed hand just four times in the entire contest as SE jumped to a 6-1 lead early, but a 12-1 run by OBU would give them the lead early at 13-8 which would be its largest lead of the contest.
 
The Storm would finally whittle the deficit away and regain the lead on a Jobe bucket, and following a Bison shot, a Jackson bucket would regain them the lead and James Donelan would finish the half with a bucket just before the buzzer to give SE a 27-23 lead at the break.
 
A Riccio three at the 15:24 mark of the second half would give the team its first double-digit lead at 36-25, and after an OBU bucket, Buckingham would cue a 19-3 run which was capped by a Jackson layup with 7:50 to play which opened up a 55-30 lead.
 
Southeastern would finish the game by outscoring the Bison 8-5 over the final seven-plus minutes, capped by Riccio's final bucket with 1:01 to play which set the final score at 63-35.