Sunday, January 20, 2013

PORTLAND, Ore. - Powered by big nights from Liam Gibcus and Abebe Demissie, Alaska Anchorage rallied for a 65-60 victory over Alaska Fairbanks in a Great Northwest Athletic Conference game Saturday at the Patty Center in Fairbanks.

Elsewhere, Western Washington remained unbeaten crushing Saint Martin's 104-56, Seattle Pacific  beat Central Washington 80-71, Montana State Billings edged Northwest Nazarene 63-61 and Western Oregon outscored Simon Fraser 78-60.

The Seawolves (11-4, 4-3), who earned their third straight win, got 18 points, six rebounds and a career-high six assists from Gibcus, a 6-10 center, while Demissie finished with 17 points and 10 rebounds recording his second career double-double.

Ronnie Baker led the Nanooks (10-5, 5-2), who entered with a six-game win streak,  with 15 points, and point guard Pat Voeut had 14 points and eight assists.

UAA trailed 32-25 at halftime before rallying for a 14th straight victory in the rivalry. Gibcus, the Seawolves’ only 4th-year senior, scored 14 of his points after the break and shot 8 of 14 from the floor before fouling out late.

“It was a really great defensive effort from our players,” said UAA coach Rusty Osborne. “They did a great job of overcoming the adversity of missing a key player, with multiple guys stepping up.”

The Seawolves were playing for the first time this season without second-leading scorer Teancum Stafford (12.6 ppg), who missed the game with an injury.

Western Washington 104, Saint Martin's 56

Austin Braff had 17 points and 12 rebounds and  Rico Wilkins came off the bench to score 17 as Western Washington (16-0, 7-0) extended its GNAC-record winning streak to 22 games at Lacey.  Bragg missed just one shot converting on six of seven field goals and all four of his foul shots.  He made his only three-pointer.

Wilkins was perfect from the arc (3 of 3) and was 6 of 10 overall.  Richard Woodward and Anye Turner had 11 points each and Paul Jones scored 10.

Saint Martin's Roger O'Neill scored 14 points increasing his career point total to 1,000 points.  Eric Taylor had 10 points.  But the Saints (6-9, 2-5) shot just 21.6 percent (16 of 74) compared to 58.2 percent (39 of 67) by the Vikings, who made 11 of 17 three-point shots and set a GNAC record for lowest opponent field goal percentage allowed in a conference game.

The old record was 22.6 by Seattle Pacific against Montana State Billings on Feb. 7, 2008.  SPU also set a GNAC record in that contest for largest winning margin (56 points).

Seattle Pacific 80, Central Washington 71

Patrick Simon scored 20 points, including two pivotal baskets inside the final two minutes to lead sixth-ranked Seattle Pacific (13-2, 6-1) past Central Washington (10-6, 4-4) at Nicholson Pavilion.

SPU gained its largest lead at 61-50 on a layup by Andy Poling with 7:32 left to play. But CWU scored the next six points, all from the free throw line, to ignite a 16-5 run.

Jordan Coby capped that surge on a 3-pointer with 3:02 remaining that tied the score 66-66. Scott Morse responded with a trey with 2:28 showing on the clock that put the Falcons ahead for good with a 69-66 edge.  

Central drew within 69-68 on two free throws from Coby, but Simon answered by converting a layup with 1:59 left. The Wildcats final rally, that cut the deficit to 72-70, was turned away when Simon rebounded a teammate’s miss and dropped it in with 46 seconds to play. SPU converted 6 of 8 free throws during the last 38 seconds to secure the win.

In addition to Simon, SPU was led by Poling with 14 points, David Downs with 12 points and nine assists and Jobi Wall with 11 points.  Mark McLaughlin led the Wildcats with 18 points.  Brandon Magee had his third double-double of the season with 10 points and 10 rebounds.

Montana State Billings 63, Northwest Nazarene 61

Omar McDade scored 21 points and hit a go-ahead three-pointer with 1:42 remaining as Montana State Billings (9-9, 2-5) earned a 63-61 road win at Northwest Nazarene (9-7, 3-5).

The Yellowjackets  closed the contest on an 8-0 run after trailing 61-55 with 4:46 left in the game. McDade made seven of his 15 shots from the field, including 3 of 8 from behind-the-arc. Sam Johnson added 17 points and Jarrell Crayton had 13 points and a team-high nine rebounds. 

Kenny Jones led the Crusaders with 16 points and Kevin Rima added 13 points and nine rebounds.  Jonathan Hawkins had 11 points and Grayson Moore grabbed 12 rebounds.

Western Oregon 78, Simon Fraser 60

Andy Avgi and Kolton Nelson each hit 5 of 6 shots finishing with 15 and 12 points, respectively, to lead Western Oregon past Simon Fraser.

The Wolves (8-7, 3-4), who led 42-18 at halftime, outshot the Clan 52.1 percent (25 of 48) to 34.9 percent (22 of 63) and outrebounded SFU 38-28.

Dillon Hamilton, Taylor Dunn annd Anto Olah each had 11 for the Clan (5-10, 0-7).