Storm Down NWOSU for Ninth-Straight Win

Box Score ALVA, Okla. – Adam Dworsky dropped a game-high 21 points to lead Southeastern to its ninth-straight win of the season, downing Northwestern Oklahoma State 72-58 on Saturday afternoon in Alva, Okla.
 
The win lifts the Savage Storm to 9-1 on the year and 4-0 in Great American Conference play heading into a 12-day Christmas break in the schedule.
 
Nine wins is the longest winning streak since SE put together 10-straight late in the 2018-19 season, winning eight in-a-row to end the regular season and two more in the GAC tournament.
 
"We're not a flashy defensive team at all," said head coach Kelly Green. "We don't get out and get right in people. We don't cause many turnovers. We're just trying to get our guys to play position defense and play sound. Make teams score over the top of us is what our objective is. We talked about before the game that we had to keep them out of the paint and for the most part we did a pretty good job of it."
 
Dworsky was 8-of-13 from the field and pitched in across all aspects as he packaged his 21 points with six rebounds and six assists.
 
Jett Sternberger was next in line with 17 thanks to a 4-of-6 effort from beyond the arc, while Kellen Manek rounded out the double-digit scoring with 11.
 
It was the first game all season that Southeastern's dynamic bench duo of Ante Brzovic and Bobby Johnson were both held to single digits, with Brzovic finishing with nine points and Johnson turning in eight.
 
Manek matched the game-high for rebounds with seven as Southeastern held a 34-to-32 edge on the boards as a team.
 
NWOSU would open play with a three and SE trailed out of the gate as the teams got off to a slow offensive start, playing to a 4-4 tie by the 16:20 mark of the first half.
 
The pace would begin to pick up as the teams traded buckets on the way to a 10-10 the by the 14:31 mark.
 
With 12:55 a Johnson three would put SE in front 14-12 and kick off a 19-8 run over the next 6:57 to mount a 30-18 lead with 6:25 to play in the half.
 
The Rangers would get a bucket to end that run and cut the gap to 10 points, but a Sternberger three would kick off a second run, this one 12-4 over 3:30 to take the biggest lead of the half at 42-24 with 2:15 to play.
 
NWOSU would answer over the final two minutes with the final six points of the half, closing the Storm advantage to 42-30 at the halftime break.
 
The Rangers opened the second half on a 5-0 run to trim the Storm advantage to seven points early, but a Manek layup would provide an SE answer to end the rally and kick off a 10-1 run capped by a Dworsky jumper to retake a double-digit lead at 52-36 with 15:48 to play.
 
Southeastern would push its lead out to match the largest of the day at 56-38 on a Dworsky layup with 13:14 remaining.
 
The lead would remain near 15 points or beyond until NWOSU put together a later 6-0 run to close the gap to 67-56 with 1:27 remaining.
 
That was as close as the game would get however as the Storm would offset Ranger buckets with free throws to pick up the 72-58 win.