Buckingham Hits Scoring Mark, Career High in Win

DURANT, Okla. – Kevin Buckingham dropped a career-high 33 points and joined the 1,000-point club in the process while leading Southeastern to an 84-57 win over Harding on Thursday night in Searcy, Ark.
 
The Savage Storm improve to 12-5 overall and 8-5 in Great American Conference play heading into a Saturday afternoon matchup with Arkansas Tech at 3 p.m. in Russellville, Ark.
 
Buckingham entered the night needing 15 points to reach the 1,000-point plateau and proceeded to post a 22-point first half, hitting 10-of-12 shots and a pair of threes.  He became the 13^th player in Southeastern men's basketball history to reach 1,000 points and finished the night with 33 points to pass Dan Kobiske and into 12^th on the all-time career scoring list.
 
"Congratulations to Kevin," said head coach Kelly Green of Buckingham reaching the 1,000-point mark, "He really works at his game and he takes care of his body.  Really happy for him and happy for our guys.  It's a great credit to not only Kevin, but to our other guys."
 
"We're moving at a much better pace," said Green, "And we're scoring much better now. You've got to win the games you're supposed to win.  We talk about playing our best basketball in February and tomorrow is February 1.  This was a concerning game, Jeff Morgan does a great job and they have a great crowd. And in a game like this you don't want to give them too much life and too much hope."
 
Buckingham finished the night shooting 14-of-17 from the field and hit three threes and was joined in double-digits by Kellen Manek who turned in 10 points on a 5-of-7 shooting effort.
 
The offense clicked all night as the Storm hit 55.6 percent from the floor and drained nine threes while holding the Bisons to 36.7 percent shooting performance.
 
SE put up 20 assists as a team on the night with Jett Jobe and Al Ervin dishing out seven each to lead all players in the contest.
 
On the glass, Buckingham came into the contest needing 13 rebounds to reach 500 career boards and he hauled in eight to lead the Storm and heads into Saturday needing five rebounds to reach the 500 mark.
 
Ervin was right behind with six boards, while Manek chipped in five.
 
Buckingham scored 22 of the team's 41 first half points, with Manek adding six points over the first 20 minutes, while Ervin added five points.
 
The teams traded buckets out of the gate with three ties and eight lead changes over the first 8:39 of the game before a Todd Dawkins three with 11:41 to go in the half would give SE a two-possession lead at 17-13.
 
 After a HU three the Storm used an 11-2 run capped by an Ervin layup to push the lead out to 28-18 with 7:08 to go in the first half.
 
The Bisons would whittle the SE lead back to six points with 6:15 to play in the half, but the Storm would outscore Harding 13-4 over the final six minutes of the half to take a 41-26 lead into the break.
 
A Ziga Zatezic layup three minutes into the second half would push the Storm lead out to 18 points before HU pieced together a 9-0 rally and cut the lead to single digits at 49-40 with 14:15 to play.
 
Southeastern would go back to the workhorse of the evening and Buckingham would convert a layup off an Ervin pass on the next possession and add a three-point play a possession later to kick off an 11-0 run that was capped by a Buckingam layup to make the score 60-40 with 11:29 to play.
 
The Storm lead would hit a game-high 26 points with 4:16 to play on a pair of Jobe free throws and then match it twice in the final three minutes before Southeastern would walk out with the 84-57 victory.