ROLLA, Mo. – Missouri S&T was cruising along late in the first half Thursday night in its Great Lakes Valley Conference matchup with Rockhurst – but like a race car that suddenly blew an engine, the Miners saw the tables turn as the Hawks rallied from a 13-point deficit and defeated S&T 91-79 at Gibson Arena.
The Miners (9-6, 3-5 GLVC) led the Hawks (8-8, 4-4 GLVC) 42-29 after
Lovell Williams (Rogers, MN/Maple Grove) hit the second of two free throws with 1:41 to go in the opening half, but Rockhurst scored the final eight points of the half on two three-pointers by Miles White sandwiched around a basket by Timaris Brown, then carried that momentum into the second half to erase the remainder of that deficit within the first three minutes and took the lead for good on another trey by White just over a minute later.
S&T and Rockhurst went back and forth for much of the first half, but an 8-0 spurt by the Miners that was capped by a three-pointer by
Manu Musemena (Liege, Belgium/) put S&T in the lead. Moments later,
Kaden Froebe (Lincoln, IL/Lincoln) hit two free throws to begin a 10-0 run by the Miners, as S&T would outscore the Hawks 21-3 over a span of 6:29 to build its 13-point lead.
However, the Hawks made the run to close the half trailing by only five as they shot 51.7 percent in the opening half and connected on five-of-nine from three-point range, while S&T made seven threes itself and was good on 50 percent of its attempts from the floor.
S&T did push its lead back to seven in the opening minute of the second half on a driving lay-up by
Alex Benassi (Lee's Summit, MO/Lee's Summit), but Brown got hot from beyond the arc as he hit a trio of three-pointers in a span of 1:21, the last of which tied the game at 48. After Jake Auer hit a foul shot after a flop was called against the Miners, Benassi went coast-to-coast after a missed shot by the Hawks to put S&T back into the lead at 50-49.
White answered with a three on Rockhurst's next trip down the floor and the Hawks never trailed again, pushing their lead into double figures at the 9:23 mark as the Miners could only get as close as six in the final eight minutes. Rockhurst kept S&T at bay as it made 21 of its final 33 shots in the contest and finished the night at 55.9 percent from the field.
Williams led four Miners in double figures with 20 points and also finished with a season-high nine assists, while
Julien Smith (Fort Worth, TX/Northwest) scored 14 points and became the seventh Miner in history to surpass the 1,500-point mark in the process. S&T also got 13 points from
Ikenna Okeke (Bolingbrook, IL/Romeoville) and 12 from Froebe as it shot 45 percent from the field in the game.
Brown had 30 points to pace the Hawks and White added 21.
Missouri S&T will host William Jewell in a 3 p.m. game Saturday at Gibson Arena.
