Oakland climbs into fourth in Summit League standings
BY DAN STICKRADT
SENIOR EDITOR
dan.stickradt@northoaklandsports.com
ROCHESTER HILLS — With the Summit League men’s basketball tournament only three weeks away, Oakland has come to the realization that it will not defend its regular season crown it has owned for two years. The Golden Grizzlies can still play for at best a No 3 seed if it wins out down the stretch and receives a little help from others throughout the conference.
Oakland took a step in that direction on Saturday, topping visiting IPFW, 93-82, at the Athletics Center O’rena.
Oakland moved to 8-7 in the league and 14-13 overall, which put Oakland into a fourth-place tie with three league games left.
“Right now we’ll worry about Wednesday’s (home finale) and then we’ll worry about Saturday’s game,” said Oakland coach Greg Kampe. “I think that we could be in position to finish no worse than fourth based on our remaining schedule. That doesn’t mean we’ll do that. We’ve had surprises all season long. Anything can happen.
“We could finish third, fourth, fifth or sixth,” added Kampe, who is operating with only four experienced players from last year’s Summit League regular season and tournament championship team. “We don’t want to have to finish sixth and have to face both Dakotas (South Dakota State, North Dakota State) and then Oral Roberts in order to win the title.”
Against IPFW, the Golden Grizzlies were down 51-50 with 14:51 to go. Travis Bader hit a short-range jumper to put Oakland up 52-51 with 1:29 left. That ignited a 22-4 run over the next seven-plus minutes, with Corey Petros’ putback on his own miss gave Oakland a 72-55 edge with 7:56 to play.
IPFW (10-15, 4-11) could not close the gap down to under five points.
LAYING IT IN: Oakland junior Drew Valentine puts up two of his 19 points in the Golden Grizzlies' 93-82 win Saturday over IPFW. Staff Photo | Dan Stickradt
Frank Gaines, a non-factor in the two team’s game last month, finished with a team-high 30 points to lead IPFW. Jonny Marlin added 13 points and McCorkle scored 10 for the Mastadons, who held a 36-32 edge on the glass.
Oakland held a 17-4 advantage in points scored off turnovers in the second half, where they held a 50-42 edge overall.
Mario Hines hit a pair of foul shots to cut the Oakland lead down to 81-75 and Trey McCorkle jumper trimmed the deficit down to 86-80 with 1:54 to go. The Mastadons could get no closer, although the Grizzlies had a difficult time putting IPFW away until the final minute.
“That’s the sign of a young team,” said Kampe. “We have to understand that when we get it to 8-10 points, we have to put accelerator and make that eight-point lead (into) a 22-point lead. For us, we struggle with that. We get a steal and miss a layup. We miss two free throws. It’s those little things and we talked about that. Give them credit. They made a couple of tough shots to get back in it.”
Reggie Hamilton’s three-pointer at the end of the first half gave Oakland a 43-40 lead. Hamilton, who now entered the game second in the nation at 24.3 points a game, poured in a game-high 31 points to pace Oakland and added five rebounds, five assists and two steals for good measure. He scored 16 points in the second half.
DRIVING PAST: Oakland's Reggie Hamilton moves around the pick of Kyle Sikora during the Grizzlies' victory Saturday at the O'rena. Staff Photo | Dan Stickradt
Drew Valentine joined Oakland’s four players in double figures with 19 points and six rebounds, while Bader’s drained four 3-pointers and scored 18. Ryan Bass, coming off a one-game suspension, scored 13 for the Grizzlies.
Oakland is still trying to gain a measure of consistency after not only graduating three players, plus the loss of four other players in the past year for various reasons.
“We just got to do all of the little things that coach’s (talks about),” said Valentine. “We have to be in position defensively, be more crisp offensively, box out and rebound. Just the little things like that. If we keep doing that, then we’re going to be a difficult team to beat in March.”
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Category: Campus Clips, Colleges / Other, Oakland University
