UMC GOLDEN EAGLES MEN’S BASKETBALL SUFFERS LOPSIDED LOSS IN U-W PARKSIDE INVITATIONAL TITLE GAME

A slow sluggish start proved costly as the University of Minnesota Crookston Golden Eagles Men’s Basketball team lost to tournament host University of Wisconsin-Parkside 78-56 in the Parkside Invitational Tournament Championship game played at DeSimone Gymnasium in Kenosha, WI.

Minnesota Crookston point guard Harrison Cleary (Sr., Oak Creek, WI) opened the scoring with a three-pointer on UMC’s opening possession, giving the Golden Eagles a 3-0 lead. Wisconsin-Parkside answered with, and 8-0 run, taking an 8-3 lead with 17:59 to play in the first half. Malcolm Cohen (R-Sr., Detroit, MI) made a lay-up to stop the scoring run bringing UMC within 8-5, but the Rangers answered with baskets from Joey St. Pierre (R-Soph., Spring Grove, IL) and Sam Wilke (R-Fr., Beaver Dam, WI) extending Wisconsin-Parkside’s lead to 17-7. Harrison Cleary made his second three-pointer bringing the Golden Eagles within 17-10 before a Reed Miller (Fr., Appleton, WI) triple cut UMC’s deficit down to 21-15. The Rangers led by as many as 16 points in the first half with 5:00 to play in the half, but a Harrison Cleary jump shot sparked a 6-0 run for the Golden Eagles, cutting the visitors’ deficit down to 33-23. Back-to-back Minnesota Crookston three-pointers around a UW-Parkside lay-up trimmed the Golden Eagles’ deficit down to 35-29. The Rangers ended the first half with a three-pointer taking a 40-29 lead into halftime. “The slow start to this game, just like the first game (of the weekend) is very concerning,” said Minnesota Crookston head coach Dan Weisse. “Just like the three-point field foal percentage (was concerning). Were they the home team? Yes, but we need to learn how to win on the road. With the slow start combined with their shooting percentage, that’s a recipe for disaster. We’ve got to get that figured out. They were just taking certain things away. We did have looks, and we’ve got to knock some of those downs. When the ball was moving, we got pretty much everything we wanted.”

Wisconsin-Parkside opened the second half with an 8-0 run taking a 48-29 lead before Harrison Cleary scored UMC’s first second-half points with a pair of free-throws bringing the Golden Eagles within 48-31 with 17:55 to play. “We had to start better in the second half than we did in the first half,” explained Weisse. “A lot of that stuff is correctable. I’m not happy with our execution of many things, but a lot of this is controllable stuff.” Minnesota Crookston continued to struggle in the second half with another 8-0 run by the Rangers’ extending the host’s lead to 56-31. A Malcolm Cohen lay-up through a foul plus the free-throw cut UMC’s deficit down to 71-47, but the Rangers proved to be too much for the Golden Eagles’ defense. Wisconsin-Parkside’s lead grew to as many as 31 points in the second half, and UMC was never able to trim the deficit under 22 points in the final fifteen minutes of the game as the Rangers cruised to a 78-56 win. “It’s a humbling loss,” summarized Weisse. “But if you’re going to have one, let’s have it now. Let’s learn from it because if we don’t learn from it than what’s the point.”

Minnesota Crookston falls to 2-2. The Golden Eagles return to the court Thursday when UMC hosts Bemidji State in an NSIC matchup at Lysaker Gymnasium tipping off at 6:00 P.M. on KROX. UW-Parkside improves to 2-2.