ST. MARY-OF-THE-WOODS, Ind. – Saint Mary-of-the-Woods will see their run in the River States Conference Tournament continue into the semifinals after taking down No. 7 IU-Southeast on Wednesday evening by the score of 87-60 inside Hamilton Arena. The Woods improved to 24-5 on the season with the victory.
No. 2 Saint Mary-of-the-Woods will continue their historic run when they host No. 3 Shawnee State on Saturday, March 2 inside Hamilton Arena. Tip-off is slated for 4 p.m. (ET). SMWC has now won 10 games in a row and 18 of their last 19. Shawnee State advanced with an 89-76 victory this evening over Ohio Christian.
Entering the contest with a school-record 640 points scored,
Cobie Barnes continued by posting 15 points with eight assists and six rebounds in the come-from-behind victory. In fact, six Pomeroys reached double figures scoring including Barnes as well as
Tarik Dixon with 13 points – including a trio of 3-pointers, Tupuola with 13 points,
Chaz Birchfield who tallied 14 points,
Greg Jenkins who scored 12 points, and finally
Greg Johnson with 10 points. Saint Mary-of-the-Woods tallied 53.2 percent shooting in the contest and shared the ball well by posting 22 assists on 33 made baskets.
A thunderous dunk by
Shon Tupuola opened the second half scoring on the Pomeroys' opening possession to get SMWC within a point and then Barnes became the first player to reach double figures scoring with a 3-pointer off the right wing as SMWC completely erased the deficit and gained a 35-33 advantage less than two minutes after the break. It became a 12-0 run for the Pomeroys when
Greg Jenkins went the length of the floor and laid the ball through the hoop to stretch the lead out to 39-33 with 17:30 remaining and forced IU-Southeast to burn a timeout. Barnes made it a 14 in a row for the Pomeroys with a driving lay-up to stretch the cushion out to eight points. The 16-0 run continued with a Jenkins second-chance bucket to make it 43-33 but IU-Southeast would score on consecutive possessions around a
Greg Johnson triple to cut into the SMWC lead at 46-38 with 15:33 left on the clock.
Tank Dixon buried a 3-pointer with just over 12 minutes remaining off the Barnes' assist to run the Pomeroy advantage out to 51-42. The second half offensive explosion continued when Dixon hit a trifecta for the second consecutive trip down the court off Barnes' seventh assist which gave SMWC a double-digit lead at 54-43 with just over 11 minutes remaining.
Barnes opened the scoring for the Pomeroys with a bucket just one minute into the contest to knot the contest early at 2. A pair of
Greg Jenkins charity tosses with 15:15 on the clock gave SMWC a brief advantage at 11-10 before IU-Southeast countered with seven in a row to stake themselves to a 17-11 cushion. The Pomeroys were able to break a nearly three-minute scoring drought with a
Shon Tupuola dunk off the feed from Barnes as the clock ticked towards seven minutes remaining in the first half to draw within 21-18. A
Chaz Birchfield lay-up got the Poms within 24-20 with 5:28 on the clock before IU-Southeast countered with a Lane Lauderbaugh 3-pointer to stretch their advantage back out to 27-20.
Barnes hit a pair of charity tosses with just under two minutes before the half to get the Pomeroys within 31-25 and then after a steal he went coast-to-coast to trim the IU-SE advantage down to just four points.
DaMeriz Merriweather drilled a 3-pointer with 12 seconds left in the opening stanza to cut the IU-SE lead down to just 33-30 at the break.
Cobie Barnes led the way for SMWC at the half with eight points.
IU Southeast was paced in the contest by Jocobi Hendricks with 24 points. Hendricks entered the contest leading the RSC in points per game by averaging over 28 per contest – a number which was fourth-best nationally.
Saint Mary-of-the-Woods will see their historic season continue this Saturday, March 2 when they host Shawnee State at 4 p.m. inside Hamilton Arena.
