SPRINGFIELD, Ohio – Steve Moore fired his team up by taking a "very controlled charge" during the walkthrough portion of Saturday's shootaround, and the rest you could say was legendary.
The College of Wooster men's basketball team (21-7) won its North Coast Athletic Conference-leading 17th tournament with a convincing 87-63 victory over fourth-ranked, and archrival, Wittenberg University (26-2) on Saturday afternoon at Pam Evans Smith Arena. With the win, Wooster's guaranteed a spot in next week's NCAA Div. III Championships field, where the Fighting Scots are set to extend their Div. III record to 18 consecutive tourney berths.
Wooster's lead was just 41-40 with 17:17 to go, and that's when things really clicked in all phases for the Scots, who responded with a 20-5 run that all but clinched the victory. A key bucket in that stretch came when junior Keonn Scott splashed down a three-ball that made it 49-40 with 14:52 remaining. Leading up to that, it was the Danyon Hempy show, with the senior drilling a three-ball of his own on the possession prior. Next, the Al Van Wie NCAC Tournament Most Outstanding Player wasn't having any of it when Wittenberg's Rashaad Ali-Shakir hoisted up from range. The Scots' four-year star swatted that attempt away, chased down the rebound, brought the ball up the court, and then flipped the ball to Scott in transition.
Steals by senior Trenton Tipton, junior Dontae Williams, and Hempy followed later in the run, which saw Wooster pull ahead 61-45 when Tipton followed up a Wooster miss with a stick-back at the 9:25 mark. Wooster's lead didn't dip below 14 the rest of the way.
Prior to Wooster pulling away in the second half, the two archrivals appeared to be headed toward another instant classic, something one of small college basketball's greatest all-time rivalries certainly doesn't have a shortage of. After all, the first half featured four lead changes and four ties before Wooster went into halftime with a 37-34 lead.
At the onset, Wooster started with a 7-0 run, and Wittenberg didn't find the scoring column until Jake Bertemes knocked down a pair of free throws with 15:25 remaining in the opening half. Wooster stayed on top until Conor Seipel's free throws with 6:56 to go gave the Tigers a 19-18 lead.
Tipton, who scored a career-high 22 points, drained a go-ahead three-ball with 1:15 to go before halftime. Then, sophomore Hamilton Johnson tied up Bertemes in the corner not long after for a steal, and Scott knocked down a jumper from the wing that up the lead to 37-32. Seipel's stick-back closed the gap to three points at the half.
Hempy's recent series of milestones continued on Saturday. First, his fast-break layup with 2:26 left in the first half broke Ohio Wesleyan University's Scott Tedder's 34-year-old NCAC Tournament record for total points, a total Hempy upped to 90 by game's end. Hempy opened Wooster's scoring in the second half with a jumper from near the free-throw line, and that marked career points 1,999 and 2,000 for the senior. He scored a game-high 29 points on 12-of-17 shooting, and now has 2,014 career points, the fourth-most in NCAC history.
Tipton, who earned a spot on the all-tournament team, was on fire all afternoon. The biology major was 8-of-10 from the floor, which included a 4-of-6 mark from three-point range. Hardaway secured a game-high 10 rebounds, while he and Williams dished out five assists apiece.
Wooster shot 57.9 percent (33-of-57) for the game, was 8-of-15 on three-pointers, and 13-of-14 at the free throw line. Wooster had an eight-rebound edge (30-22) on Wittenberg, and only turned the ball over 11 times.
Seipel's 18 points led three Tigers in double figures. He was Wittenberg's high man in the rebounding column with eight.
Wittenberg shot 46.3 percent (25-of-54) for the game, was 6-of-20 from three-point land, and turned the ball over a season-high 16 times.
Wittenberg's James Johnson and Seipel, Denison University's Conor Fenton, and Oberlin College's Christian Fioretti rounded out the all-tournament team.
Of note, Wooster's now 9-5 all-time in NCAC Tournament title games against Wittenberg, which includes a remarkable 5-1 ledger at Pam Evans Smith Arena. Wooster now leads the all-time series 62-60.
The NCAA Div. III Championship field will be announced at 12:30 p.m. ET on Monday on NCAA.com. The College will be hosting a watch party in the Lowry Center.