THUNDER BAY – For three of the four quarters on Saturday night, the Lakehead Thunderwolves dominated the Waterloo Warriors.
That other quarter was a doozy, though.
The visiting Warriors, looking to escape their weekend trip to the C.J. Sanders Fieldhouse with a series split, poured in 34 points in the third, turned a nine-point halftime deficit into a 14-point lead and held off a furious final-period comeback by the Wolves to claim an 80-74 OUA men's basketball triumph.
“It was an energy thing,” said LU forward Kache Kopec, who had 11 of his 16 points in the fourth, after sitting out Friday night’s game as a coach’s decision.
“We’ve got to get up and stay up. We’re coming out good. Both games we came out hot. They’re a good team and they’re going to battle with you the whole time. It’s just us getting the ball moving, making some shots and getting some stops.”
It was also a foul thing.
On the Warriors first three baskets of the second half the Thunderwolves committed a foul during the shot process giving Waterloo a chance at three straight three-point plays.
David Ramon Prados made the first free-throw and Nedium Hodzic, who dropped 33 on LU in Friday night’s 98-89 loss, made the other two, on his way to a 34-point game that led all scorers.
The 9-2 run cut the Lakehead lead to three, which Kristian Vander Kemp erased with shot from beyond the arc.
Powered by Hodzic and Simon Petrov, who collected 29 points, the Warriors went on a 16-4 run and led 63-49 at quarter’s end.
It’s a quarter Lakehead interim coach Ryan Thomson would like to forget.
“I think it started defensively. We were getting scored on a little bit, started putting them on the line. That kind of carried over into our offence, where we got stagnant. We were kind of pounding the ball, not moving it as much as we wanted to, not really trusting each other as much as we need to,” Thomson said, his team falling to 2-14.
The defeat tarnished a fantastic first-half effort from guard Mor Menashe, who wound up with 25 points and a dozen boards, including four-of-five from long distance. Menashe, in his final season, had 18 at the break, hitting a pair of threes in the first to help the Wolves survive a 6-0 start by the Warriors.
“He’s a good player,” Kopec said. “If you give him the reads he wants, if you give him what he wants, he’s going to make you pay for it.”
A 12-2 start, punctuated by two treys from Menashe and another by Kopec, staked the Wolves to a 29-14 advantage, though the Warriors (7-9) closed the gap to 38-29 by halftime.
Lakehead travels to Windsor next weekend for a pair against the Lancers.
