Buckingham Gets Record, Dworsky Steals the Show

DURANT, Okla. – On a night when Kevin Buckingham became the Great American Conference career leader in rebounds, it would be Adam Dworsky who grabbed the attention as his 25-point performance lifted Southeastern to a 79-57 win over rival East Central on Thursday night in front of the largest crowd of the season at Bloomer Sullivan Arena.
 
The Savage Storm pick up their fourth-straight win and improve to  13-3 overall on the season and 7-2 in Great American Conference play heading into a Saturday afternoon rematch with Southwestern Oklahoma State at 3 p.m. in Weatherford, Okla.
 
"Coach Quinn always talks to me about if teams are going to go under ball screens and dare me to shoot so to speak," said Dworsky. "I got to just be confident. And I got a good look on my first shot of the game and it felt really good and its one of those things where you see one shot go down then the flood gates start to open up a little bit."

"It was a team effort," said head coach Kelly Green, "We really didn't pay any attention toi any that anybody else was doing. We tried to get in our gaps and we tried to get off over into help. Go through screens the way we normally go through them. Hedge when we're supposed to hedge. Down them when we're supposed to down them, and kind of do what we do. That was one focal point we put on the board, just be SE." 

Buckingham needed six rebounds to become the conference's all-time leader in career rebounds and he would pass that mark in the first half where he picked up seven boards on his way to a 10 rebounds effort. He passes Southern Nazarene's Noah Starkey who became the leader last season and now lifts his career rebounding total to 743.
 
However, Dworsky would steal the show as he connected on his first six shots, two of them from beyond the arch, and barely slowed off that pace as he finished with a game and season-high 25 points on 10-of-16 shooting overall and a 4-olf-7 effort from long range.
 
And to avoid being called selfish he continued to distribute the ball as well, handing out seven assists while tacking on four rebounds and snagging a career-high five steals.
 
Kellen Manek was next in line with 12 points while Kayo Goncalves would add 10.
 
A'Torey Everett checked in with nine while Buckingham added eight points to his 10 rebounds, snapping a 37-game streak of double-digit scoring for Buckingham.
 
SE shot 48.5 percent for the game, including a 51.6 percent effort over the second half while knocking down nine threes for the game, hitting at a 39.1 percent clip.
 
Goncalves just missed a double-double with nine rebounds as the Storm piled up 37 for the game.
 
A three from Manek opened scoring as Southeastern reeled off a 9-0 run to start the game, all while holding the Tigers scoreless for just over four minutes to open the contest.
 
A Dworsky three with 13:23 to go in the first half would stretch the lead to double-figures, but a Tiger run in response would narrow the advantage to five points at 16-11.
 
SE would fire back with a 10-3 run and another Dworsky three would give the Storm a 26-14 lead at the midway point of the half.
 
Over the next 10 minutes the Storm would keep ECU at arms-length, with the Tigers once closing the gap to five points with 6:06 to play, but the Storm had an answer and would push back out to a 41-32 lead at the half.
 
The teams traded shots early in the second half, with the lead teetering back and forth before settling back at nine points with 12:25 to play.
 
A Dworsly bucket with 11:07 to play would push the lead to 11 points and set off an 11-2 run that saw the lead reach 66-48 on a Manek three with 6:42 to play.
 
The Tigers would get no closer than 15 points after that point and it was the Storm who closed out the game on a 12-2 run to fashion the final score of 79-57.