MOUNT VERNON – Mount Vernon Nazarene’s men’s basketball team earned its fourth win of the season over an NAIA Division II Top-25 foe on Tuesday night, comfortably getting past No. 14 Spring Arbor 72-63 in Ariel Arena.
“I’m really proud of our guys and their fierce defensive effort tonight,” coach Jared Ronai said. “Spring Arbor is really good and they present multiple challenges. Our guys were locked in toour defensive keys from the tip. We have got to continue our process and get better tomorrow.”
In the opening half, MVNU turned a 16-14 deficit into a 26-16 advantage with the 12-0 run, which was then extended to a 17-2 stretch of play that made it 31-18 with 6:08 remaining in the first 20 minutes of play.
Balanced scoring for MVNU was the driving force, as the Cougars executed well on both ends of the floor and were able to create good looks at the basket for high-percentage attempts. MVNU went into the locker room with a 38-25 lead on the strength of 57 percent shooting from the floor. Spring Arbor on the other hand had 11 turnovers and was held to just 39.1 percent shooting.
The visitors tried to make a push early in the second half, and trimmed its gap to just six points within the opening five minutes of the second half. MVNU however remained composed and had timely response after timely response.
Seemingly in the blink of an eye, another dominant MVNU spurt widened the gap to 15 points, as the Cougars went on an 8-0 tear to make it 55-40 following back-to-back triples from Jevon Knox and Joe Schmitz.
From there, Spring Arbor was never able to cut it down to single digits.
With just five regular season Crossroads League matchups remaining, Spring Arbor and MVNU sit in a tie for third place in the standings.
In front of their home crowd, the Cougars finished the game shooting at a 53.8 percent clip and were 9-of-20 (45 percent) from beyond the arc against statistically one of the best defenses in the Crossroads League. Spring Arbor entered the contest holding its opponents to just 42.6 percent shooting from the field, the second-lowest mark in the league.
Four of the five starters for MVNU were in double-figure scoring, led by a 19-point and 6-rebound effort from Schmitz on 4-of- 8 from downtown. Brett Vipperman had a big double-double, his fourth of the season, by finishing with 16 points and a team-high 13 rebounds. Austin Jones added 12 points, and Jacob Paul had ten to go along with four dimes, tying with Vipperman for a team-high in the assist category.
MVNU (15-10, 7-6 CL) put an end to a three-game slide with the victory and will now prepare for an away game at Taylor University (14-11, 5-8 CL) on Saturday, Feb. 3 in Upland, Ind. Tip-off for that game is set for 3 p.m.
