THUNDER BAY – Just days after the Lakehead Thunderwolves were unceremoniously dumped from the national top 10 – despite not playing last weekend – they showed it’s where they belong.
For the fourth time this season the men’s basketball team welcomed a top 10 opponent to the C.J. Sanders Fieldhouse, and for the third time they wound up on top, rallying in the fourth to overcome a smothering University of Toronto Varsity Blues zone defence to eke out a 71-69 win.
It took a lot of perseverance, but it paid off said fourth-year forward Dylan Morrison, who led Lakehead with 14 points and kept the team competitive in the third when the Varsity Blues threatened to pull away, opening a game-high seven-point lead late in the period.
“They were definitely pushing us to the limit in the third and fourth quarter. We just had to pick it up and get a lot of the rebounds, because (earlier) we let a lot of offensive rebounds go, but we were able to pull through,” said Morrison.
It helped the shooting picked up in the third and fourth, after Lakehead hit just three of 19 shots in the second as Toronto turned a one-point deficit after the first into three-point lead at the half.
“Throughout the whole game they kind of weren’t falling that well. The rim wasn’t loving us that much, but we kind of picked it up and got a little bit of luck on our side and closed it out,” said Morrison, who had nine rebounds and two blocked shots in the contest.
“That zone definitely took us out of the game a little bit. We were prepared for it, but at the same time they’re a really good team … how they play their zone. Overall I think next game we’re going to be more prepared for it and have our shooters open and our leading scorers will try to do our thing.”
Usually that’s Michael Okafor, who the Varsity Blues kept in check for the first three quarters. But you can only keep an all-star down for so long and when it mattered most, Okafor came through.
Down four early in the final frame, he spun and fired up a hoop, drew the foul and sunk the shot from the charity stripe to cut Toronto’s lead to one. Back at the line less than a minute later, Okafor hit both to give LU a one-point advantage, a lead they’d never surrender.
“As much as it’s a credit to our guys, it’s a credit to their zone,” said LU coach Ryan Thomson. “it just changes the flow of the game so much. But our guys stuck together and kept working to get the best shot.
“I thought in the first half we got out-transitioned and we got some really good looks. The second half we didn’t feel like we got a lot of great looks. We got a lot of rushed turnovers, but the guys stayed together and worked to get great shots and I think it paid off.”
Lakehead looked like they might have put it away late in the fourth, after Eric Gonzalez stole the ball from Toronto’s Callum Baker, then made one of two free throws to put the T-Wolves up 67-60. Ryan Rudnick had other ideas, burying a trio of treys in the final two minutes that ultimately cut the lead to two.
Laoui Msambya had one last shot to end it at the free-throw line with four seconds to go, but missed both. However, Toronto was out of timeouts and Brown’s desperation shot fell short at the buzzer, handing Toronto just its third loss in 13 games.
