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Pointers Earn
Share of WIAC Lead with win at Eau Claire
Central Wisconsin Sunday
Original Article
Box Score
EAU CLAIRE - The Pointers
of the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point were granted a sweet
Valentine's Day gift on Saturday, a spot atop the Wisconsin Intercollegiate
Athletic Conference.
Casey Drake scored 27 points in the second half and 35 total, but UW-Stevens
Point countered with 20 points from Nick Bennett and 15 more from Jason
Kalsow in an 80-68 win over UW-Eau Claire on Saturday.
Meanwhile, UW-River Falls edged league-leading UW-Whitewater 72-70 to drop
Whitewater into a three-way tie with Falls and the Pointers atop the
conference.
"It's a different scenario now," said UWSP coach Jack Bennett, who had been
trying to focus his team on the upcoming WIAC tournament and the automatic
NCAA Division III Tournament berth that comes with winning it. "We just have
to keep doing what we have to do."
That would be playing
defense, where the Pointers (19-4, 10-4 WIAC) uncharacteristically struggled
in slowing down Drake. They threw three defenders at him before looking to
their lone senior for guidance.
"We finally put Neal (Krajnik) on him," Bennett said of maneuvering his
regular starting point guard who has come off the bench lately due in large
part to a sore foot. "(Drake) is too quick."
The rest of the Pointer
defense held Dan Archambault to six points for the Blugolds (10-14, 4-11
WIAC), after he'd scored a team-high 23 points in their previous matchup.
The win was a step forward, and a tremendous break, for a Pointer team that
has rediscovered itself since falling hard in an upset to UW-Superior on
Jan. 19 that left itself hoping for one more chance to defend the four
straight WIAC championships it has accrued since 2000.
UWSP will travel to UW-Oshkosh for their third meeting of the season - UWSP
beat the Titans in a non-league Las Vegas holiday tournament as well as in
their later WIAC meeting - and will host Superior on Saturday.
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