Late Surge Lifts Penguins Past Panthers in HL Opening Round

[IAA Fan]

The Youngstown State men's basketball team scored 14 of the final 17 points to knock off Milwaukee 63-57 in the opening round of the Horizon League Championships in front of a frenzied crowd at the Beeghly Center.

With the win, the Penguins set a YSU Division I record with 13 home wins and posted 18 wins for the first time since 2012-13.

Naz Bohannon scored 20 points to lead all scorers in the contest. Darius Quisenberry had 12 and Michael Akuchie contributed 10 points, including back-to-back 3-pointers to spur the comeback. The Penguins shot 54.2 percent in the second half and made 47.9 percent for the game. Milwaukee shot 38.9 percent from the field and made just one of their final nine field goals in the contest.

The Guins (18-14) trailed at halftime 36-30 before outscoring the Panthers (12-19), 33-21 in the second half.

Youngstown State trailed 52-46 when Akuchie hit his first 3-pointer of the night to get within three, 52-49, and hit another to get us within two after Te'Jon Lucas' 3-pointer gave the Panthers a 54-49 lead at the 6:27 mark.

Akuchie's second 3-pointer started a 12-0 run that gave the Penguins a seven-point lead, 61-54, with 21 seconds left. Bohannon scored five of those 12 points.

Garrett Covington back-door cut and layup tied the game at 54-54 and Bohannon's putback gave the Penguins the lead for good, 56-54. He and Quisenberry each added layups and Bohannon split a pair of free throws cap the run.

After a late 3-pointer by the Panthers, Morgan sealed the game with two free throws with four seconds left.

YSU got off to a slow start and trailed by nine, 13-4, in the game's first five minutes. The Penguins clawed their way back to within one, 21-20, but the Panthers went on a 14-4 run to take a 35-24 lead with 1:48 to go before the half.

The Penguins defensive pressure late in the first half led to 6-1 YSU run keyed by a Bohannon layup, two free throws by Akuchie and a layup by Quisenberry to cut the deficit to six at the intermission.

The Penguins will now play on Thursday night in the Horizon League quarterfinals against UIC at Gentile Arena at Loyola-Chicago. Tipoff is set for 8 p.m. Eastern.

[mudclods]

Great atmosphere last night!  It pretty much epitomized the 2020 season..fight back, play hard with good defense, pull games out late, and win at home.  It really amazed me how all 3 games against Milwaukee were so similar.  Milwaukee built sizable leads and if it wasn't for YSU shooting terrible for the FT line in the first matchup, YSU would have won all 3 late.   

Pretty impressive for YSU to go 13-3 at Beeghly with really 3 tough losses...the OT losses to Milwaukee and UIC and the 2 point loss to NKU.  The UIC one really stung as YSU gave up the 9 point lead in the closing mins.  That one really could have swung things had they pulled that one out.   YSU does get a break with UIC's arena not available. 

Also impressive is YSU is now 14-2 when holding teams to 70 points or less with the losses only being 2 point defeats. 

Thought last night was a great team win...obviously holding Milwaukee to 57 means a total team effort on defense.  Milwaukee only scored 3 points I think in the last 6 mins and that was the one desperation 3 in the final seconds. 

I don't know if YSU came out flat or tight, but they just couldn't get into their offense, shots weren't falling and Milwaukee was out-hustling and rebounding them.  I think the key was closing out the first half like YSU did getting that 11 point deficit cut to 6 with less than a minute to go.  Really for as bad as YSU played the first half, to be down only 6 was a positive and I felt pretty confident.  I kept thinking as the game progressed, someone has to step up and hit some 3's to win it as that was really the only difference in the game.  Covington's 3 and Akuchie's back to back 3's were the turning point. 

Is Jelani at 100% or is he battling something?  He's went scoreless in the last 3 games and his minutes have been down.  He's only taken 2 shots in the 3 games and those were last night going 0-2.  I had really hoped for a better year out of him after how he looked last year in his freshman year.  He had big games against CSU scoring 19 and 23 and had 3 other 12 point games, but overall his numbers are down from last year.