USD men’s basketball team drops third-straight league road game

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By Vance Janak

Three consecutive North Central Conference road games added up to three-straight losses for the USD men’s basketball.

The Coyotes finished their three-game road swing Saturday with a 75-71 loss to St. Cloud State in Halenbeck Hall.

Senior forward Eric Hall scored a career-high 30 points while junior center Steve Smith added 13 points for the Coyotes. Senior guard Dustin Little contributed nine points while junior Dylan Grimsley finished with eight points.

Leading the way for the Huskies was center Matt Schneck with 17 points. Forward Andrew Bernstetter added 15 points while senior David Dreas poured in 14 points. Jesse Fisher rounded out the Huskies double figurer scorers with 11 points.

The road trip, which started with a 75-60 loss last Saturday at Nebraska-Omaha, also saw the Coyotes drop a 78-77 decision Thursday night at MSU-Mankato.

In all three games, the Coyotes trailed at halftime. Against MSU-Mankato and St. Cloud State, USD held the lead or tied the game with less than four minutes to play.

With the loss, the Coyotes (19-4) drop to fourth in the NCC (4-4). Mankato holds the conference lead with a 9-1 record in league play while Augustana is second at 6-3 and UNO third at 5-4.

The Coyotes, who shared the NCC regular season title with MSU-Mankato last season, are virtually eliminated from winning the NCC title.

USD got off to a better start than SCSU as the Coyotes jumped out to a 10-5 lead on a Hall 3-pointer with 15:43 remaining in the first half.

But the Huskies battled back and took their largest lead of the first half 26-19 on a Taylor Witt 3-pointer with 7:01 remaining in the first half.

The Coyotes retook the lead 32-31 on a jump shot by junior forward Rane Mergen with 4:08 remaining in the first half. But the Huskies took a 39-35 lead into halftime.

USD took a 53-51 lead with 9:52 remaining in the game on a jump shot by Hall. The two teams swapped the lead with neither grabbing more than a two-point advantage.

Smith scored a layup with 3:53 remaining to tie the game at 61-all, but that was the closest the Coyotes would get as the Huskies slowly took control of the game to come away with the victory.

The Coyotes will face North Dakota Thursday at 8 p.m. in the DakotaDome. USD defeated UND 88-65 Jan. 19 in Grand Forks.

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