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Mules second half shooting woes costly at Washburn

Nathan Frazier scored 10 first half points

The No. 25 Washburn Ichabods went on a 23-5 second half run to get past the Central Missouri Mules by an 82-76 margin on Saturday night at Lee Arena. It was the first WU win in the series since January 3 of 2004.

The Mules (8-3, 1-1 MIAA) jumped out early on the Ichabods (9-2, 1-1 MIAA) and held the advantage the entire half. UCM pushed it to as much as 11 by the 9:21 mark but WU had a run at the lead. They cut it to a couple with 5:14 remaining but two threes by De’Andre Byrd pushed it back in control of the Mules. The Ichabods got back in it at the 2:11 mark with a three-pointer from Andrew Meile but neither team could score in the final two minutes to gain momentum.

Central Missouri went into the break with a 44-39 advantage, getting big points from Nathan Frazier off the bench with 10. Byrd tallied 12 in the half and WU’s Angel Santiago had 15. Central Missouri hit 52 percent from the floor while the ‘Bods tallied 40 percent and took seven more shots.

The Mules extended their advantage to nine in the first three minutes of the half, but went cold after that, scoring five points over the next 10 minutes. The Ichabods scored 23 during that stretch, including four three-pointers. Washburn was up by 14 with five minutes left thanks in part to their hot shooting (55 percent in the second half) and stellar interior defense. The Mules post players were held to only 6-of-20 from the field and the Ichabods had the rebound edge by four. Paul Byers and Kyle Snyder had 12 and 13 rebounds, respectively, and keyed the WU defense inside.

UCM showed some fight though. It chipped at the lead over the next four minutes, getting it down to four at 80-76 with 31 seconds remaining on a Byrd lay-up. WU hit its free throws though, and the Mules failed to convert from three in the final seconds to get any closer.

Central Missouri only managed to hit 26 percent in the second half compared to Washburn’s 55 percent. WU also drilled 50 percent of its three-pointers compared to 28 percent for UCM in the game.

Byrd set a career-high for the fifth consecutive game with 19 points while Kevin Wollbrinck hit 13-of-15 from the free throw line and tallied a career-high with 19 as well. Joe Young put up 15 while Frazier failed to score in the second half and finished with 10. Skip Thomas was the leading rebounder with 10. Santiago led four WU double-figure scorers with 22 points.