LONDON, Ont. – A dominant fourth quarter helped the Western Mustangs defeat the Lakehead Thunderwolves in a come-from-behind 77-67 victory on Saturday night at Alumni Hall.
"They showed some great mental toughness there, all the guys on our team, just to see the ball go in the basket, it was big for us," said Mustangs head coach
Brad Campbell. "For Omar and Marco to step up and making some threes, we just got some confidence, and then of course once one of them made one they made multiple, and then it just maybe got each other going a little bit."
The win, Western's second in as many nights over the Thunderwolves, gives the Mustangs sole possession of second in the OUA West with an 8-6 record. The Thunderwolves drop to 1-13, and remain at the bottom of the OUA West standings.
"We just knew what we had to do this weekend, we had to go 2-0, and now our mentality going into these next two home games is to get those two wins," said Mustangs guard
Jedson Tavernier. "We know we're capable of winning all these up coming games, and we're just trying to keep the streak going."
Marko Kovac was the top scorer for the Mustangs, registering a double-double, with 20 points and 11 rebounds. The forward was integral in the Mustangs win, scoring nine of the team's 30 points in their fourth quarter comeback.
Omar Shiddo continued his strong play from yesterday, coming in just behind Kovac on the scoresheet with 19 points.
Henry Tan also scored in the double digits for Western, contributing 15 points in the win.
For the Thunderwolves, Mor Menashe was the leading scorer for the second straight game, with 18 points and nine rebounds. Jack Bull and Kache Kopec followed with 14 and 10 points, respectively.
The Thunderwolves got off to an explosive start, jumping out to an early 11-4 lead in the first quarter. A quick lineup change for the Mustangs saw them begin to close the gap midway through the quarter, eventually taking a narrow two-point lead to close out the opening 10 minutes.
The Mustangs offence got off to a rough start, causing problems in their defensive transition, as well as with the defensive game, giving Lakehead the opportunity to dominate early on. However, the team stepped up mid-way through the quarter, making up for their slow start.
"Lakehead did a nice job of pushing the ball in transition, and due to a lot of our missed shots and poor execution at times, we really helped Lakehead's transition game," said Campbell. "Once we were able to make our shots and set our defence, it just turned the whole game around, and charged up our defence."
The Mustangs pressure caused problems for the Thunderwolves early in the second quarter, with several key steals allowing the Mustangs to build on their narrow lead. Despite shutting out Lakehead for the opening minutes of the quarter, the Thunderwolves managed to claw their way back, making it a competitive point-for-point affair. After a tight race to the buzzer, the purple and white went into halftime with a 30-27 lead over the Thunderwolves.
"We knew we needed to put pressure on their ball handlers, especially with their guys playing so many more minutes than ours, you get them tired from the stretch," said Kovac. "We just wanted to get pressure on them right away and get some steals like how it happened."
After Western outscored their opponents in both of the first two quarters, the Thunderwolves flipped the script in the third, taking the quarter 25-17 to go up 52-47 thanks to their strong shooting throughout the frame.
However, it was the fourth quarter when the Mustangs came into their own, with Shiddo and Kovac leading the way for the Mustangs comeback. Lakehead's lead reached 13 points early in the fourth, before Western began to take over, closing out the game with an incredible 28-5 run to take a 77-67 victory.
"It felt good, we fully realized that we needed to just lock back in, and it started when harry came through with three or four steals in a row," said Kovac. "It just got things flowing; Nick found open guys and we were just able to knock back shots down the stretch to come back and win."
Despite their offensive struggled early in the game, the last quarter is when it counted, with the Mustangs field goal percentage jumping to 58.8%, and the 3-point field goal percentage reaching a game high 60%.
"We were just playing percentages, we were shooting terribly the whole game, we knew that eventually they would have to fall," said Tavernier. "Marko and Omar we're just sinking threes the whole time in the fourth quarter there and they brought us back, and once one guy starts hitting everyone feeds off of him and that's where that comeback came from."
"I think just our persistence is this game was really good," said Tavernier. "We fought back and especially in the end we were saying 'we're not losing, we're not losing', and everyone came together to come out with the win."
The Mustangs next game will be this coming Wednesday, when the Mustangs take on the Guelph Gryphons at home at 8 p.m. Fans can catch all the action live on OUA.tv
