Southeastern Holds on For Win over SNU

BETHANY, Okla. – Adam Nance led a trio of double-digit scorers as Southeastern held off a second-half Southern Nazarene rally to pick up the 62-54 win on Thursday night in Bethany, Okla.
 
The win lifts the Savage Storm to 3-5 overall and in Great American Conference Western Division play heading into a Saturday afternoon matchup with Northwestern Oklahoma State at 5 p.m. in Bloomer Sullivan Arena.
 
The win also snaps a four-game losing streak against the Crimson Storm.
 
"Our guys really took the challenge of getting up and defending tonight," said head coach Kelly Green. "We've been watching film and watching how passive we are defensively. How we sit and we're reacting instead of attacking."
 
"Southern Nazarene runs their offense really well," Green continued, "And the last time we played them it was like they were running five-on-zero offense. There was no resistance from us at all. Today we challenged the guys to get up and pressure the ball more. Everybody getting over into help. And consequently, I think we had five or six charges that we took tonight, and a couple others could have gone either way. And we just made it difficult on them going to the basket."  
 
Nance turned in 13 points in his second start, hitting 5-of-7 from the field with a trio of threes to finish with 13 points.
 
Adam Dworsky was next in line with 12 points, but he flirted with a triple-double as he finished with nine assists and seven rebounds, both team-highs.
 
Vadim Clanet also added 12 points, connecting on three threes as well.
 
Bobby Johnson just missed double-figures with eight points and Jaedaun Slack finished with seven.
 
The teams opened the game trading buckets before a 6-0 run by Southeastern capped by a Markeith Williams bucket push the edge to 11-5 with 13:31 to go in the first half.
 
SNU would close the gap to two points over the next three minutes, but another 6-0 spurt capped by a Taylor Cox bucket extended the SE lead to 17-9 at the 8:02 mark.
 
The Crimson Storm would close the gap all the way down to 21-20 at the 4:39 mark, but a Dworsky three followed by a pair of Clanet threes would close out the scoring in the first half and give Southeastern a 30-20 lead at the break.
 
The Storm kicked off the second half in the same fashion they played much of the first, as a Nance three kicked off an 8-0 run to push the lead out to 38-20 by the 17:58 mark, the largest lead of the game.
 
It would remain 18 points until the 15:15 mark when SNU kicked off a 10-0 run that trimmed the SE edge down to 40-32 by the 12:04 mark.
 
RJ Weeks would connect on a jumper to stop the bleeding, but the Crimson Storm would twice more close the gap to eight points over the next two minutes.
 
Finally, back-to-back Nance threes would answer and push the Savage Storm lead out to 50-36 with 9:11 to play.
 
SNU would make one more push, chipping the SE lead down to seven points with 3:39 to play.
 
 A Weeks bucket would answer and the teams followed by trading buckets down the stretch as a 3-of-4 effort at the free throw line by Southeastern in the final 24 seconds helped hold on for a 62-54 win.