Published: Saturday, March 3, 2007
The Penguins went ice-cold from the field in a 72-55 loss to UW-Green Bay.
The Penguins went ice-cold
from the field in a 72-55 loss
to UW-Green Bay.
By PETE MOLLICA
DAYTON — All season long the Youngstown State men's basketball team has either shot well from the field and won or shot poorly and lost.
Friday night in the quarterfinals of the Horizon League postseason tournament at the Nutter Center it was not a good shooting night for the Penguins and they suffered a 72-55 loss to UW-Green Bay.
It was the Penguins' third loss to the Phoenix this season and in each game they shot the ball poorly.
Friday YSU made just 32 percent of its shots from the field (21-of-64) and was just 1-of-17 from 3-point range and the Penguins haven't won a game all season long shooting those numbers.
Defense key
Green Bay coach Tod Kowalczyk said the key to the win was making Youngstown State's leading scorers, Quin Humphrey and Keston Roberts, work for every shot.
Penguins' coach Jerry Slocum didn't argue the point, but he did make one of his own.
"Every game that Quin and Keston played this year they had to work for every shot they took," Slocum said.
"When they went in we won and when they didn't we lost. It was no different tonight.
"We went through a spell where we missed two straight easy baskets right under the hoop and then missed several free throws when we were still in the game. That wasn't defense that caused those misses," he added.
"Green Bay played good defense tonight, but we played very poorly on offense and that was the difference," Slocum said.
Leaders
Roberts led the Penguins (14-17) with 18 points, while Humphrey finished with 12, but had only two points in the second half.
Junior John Barber finished with 10 points off the bench.
The Phoenix (18-14) was led by Ryan Tillema with a game-high 22 points, while Ryan Evanochko added 17.
The Phoenix finished shooting 44.8 percent from the field and they were 5-of-14 from 3-point range. They also outrebounded the Penguins 43-36.
Kowalczyk also lauded the effort of the Penguins and Slocum.
"I have so much respect for Coach Slocum and the Penguins and for the job that he's done in rebuilding that program," Kowalczyk said.
"It was a total team effort on defense that got us this win tonight," he said.
Back and forth
The Penguins and Phoenix battled throughout most of the first half with the lead changing hands five times before Green Bay went ahead 16-15 on a basket by Mike Schachtner with just over eight minutes left in the half.
Green Bay went up 26-19 on a 3-point shot by Tillema with 4:25 left before Humphrey and Barber connected to cut the lead to 26-23 with 3:18 left.
The Phoenix then scored seven straight to jump out to a 33-23 lead before Humphrey hit a free throw just before the buzzer to cut the lead to 33-24 at the intermission.
Green Bay opened the second half with two straight Tillema baskets, one a 3-pointer to take a 14-point lead, 38-24.
YSU made a brief 6-0 run midway in the half, including two straight buckets by Roberts to get the margin down to nine points, 51-42, but that was as close as the Penguins would get.
Trailing 61-47 with 3:15 remaining the Penguins had to foul the Phoenix and Green Bay made 9-of-10 down the stretch to put the game away.
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