Northern men's basketball team wins in season opener

Northern men's basketball team wins in season opener

George Ferguson

Havre Daily News Sports
gferguson@havredailynews.com

The Montana State University-Northern men's basketball season is officially under way, and it is off to a good start. The Lights opened the 2005-06 season with an 82-54 drubbing of Concordia College of British Columbia on Thursday night in a tournament in Edmonton, Alberta.

Northern jumped all over Concordia in the first half of play, racing out to a 55-26 lead. The Lights were nearly perfect from the field in the first half, going 20-26 from the floor. They also torched Concordia for eight 3-pointers in the game's first 20 minutes en route to the halftime lead.

In the second half, the Lights worked their bench into the mix and allowed Concordia to spend the final 20 minutes of the game trying to play catchup. But the first-half margin was too much for Concordia to overcome.

For the game, the Lights shot an overwhelming 63 percent from the field and a blazing 47 percent from the 3-point line. One area in which the Lights were outplayed was rebounding. Concordia outrebounded Northern 19-17.

Individually, MSU-Northern got a game-high 24 points from senior Jordan Mathews. Mathews was 9-11 from the floor and connected on six of seven 3-point attempts. Junior college transfer Ronnie Simpson also reached double figures for the Lights, scoring 11 points. Senior Reid Stovall chipped in with 10 points. Cory Brothers and Yanif Ducreay paced the Lights' rebounding efforts with four a piece, and Brothers added three assists.

Concordia got 15 points from Michael Szynkowski and 13 points from Kris Raymond. Paul Kuperus chipped in with six points in the loss.

MSU-Northern (1-0) will continue to play in the The Kings University tournament in Edmonton through Saturday night.

Lights 82, Concordia College 54

Concordia College (0-1)

Adam Hajdarevic 2-5 0-3 4, Gaby Ferzli 0-0 0-3 2, Sam Sir 0-1 0-0 0, Paul Kuperus 2-5 2-4 6, Mike Danderfer 2-4 1-2 5, Wesley McConnel 0-0 0-0 0, Mike Szynkowski 6-11 0-2 15, Mike Montgomery 0-1 1-0 3, Kris Raymond 4-7 0-0 13, Trevor Dreger 1-3 2-0 2, Jameil Sanders 1-1 0-0 5. 18-38 15-24 54.

MSU-Northern (1-0)

Jordan Mathews 9-11 6-7 24, Nick Hitner 1-3 0-2 1, Leo Bullchild 2-4 1-3 1, Cory Brothers 2-5, 1-2 4, Reid Stovall 5-5 0-0, Brian Erickson 0-2 0-1 0, Adrian Nelson 1-1 0-0 2, Marcus Wilson 1-2 0-0 4, Cody Gillispie 3-5 1-1 7, Ronnie Simpson 4-6 3-3 11, Yanif Ducreay 2-2 1-2 4. 31-49 12-16 82.