DE PERE - St. Norbert College had an ice-cold shooting start to the second half and couldn't recover in an 82-57 loss to UW-Platteville in the championship game of the Nicolet National Bank Holiday Tournament at Mulva Family Fitness & Sports Center.
The Green Knights (8-4), who trailed 41-33 at halftime, were just 1-for-20 from the field in the first 11 minutes of the second half. Platteville (13-0), ranked No. 3 in the D3hoops.com Top 25, built a 20-point lead with 10 minutes remaining and cruised to the win.
Platteville took a 10-9 lead to open the game, but the Green Knights went on a 9-0 run to take an 18-10 advantage with 10:55 left in the first half.
Jacob Bolwerk's jumper got the run started, with
Evan Glaser splitting a pair of free throws.
Jamison Nickolai,
Jack Pettit and
Kyle Krueger capped off the run. The Pioneers responded with a 16-4 run to take a 26-22 lead with 6:42 left on a four-point play by Kyle Tuma. A Glaser basket got the Green Knights back to within two, but Platteville then scored the next eight points to go up 36-26. Bolwerk's 3-pointer as time expired sent the Green Knights into the locker room trailing 41-33.
Parker Lawrence scored with 16:35 left to bring St. Norbert to within 46-35, but the Green Knights would hit another basket until Aiden Harrington's 3-pointer with 8:55 to go to bring the score to 57-38.
St. Norbert shot 33.3 percent from the floor overall, making 20 of 60 field-goal attempts. The Green Knights were 4-for-20 from beyond the three-point arc. Bolwerk was the only Green Knight to reach double figures with a game-high 22 points.
Platteville shot 50 percent from the floor, making 28 of 56 field-goal attempts. The Pioneers were 14-for-29 (48.3 percent) from distance and held a 40-30 rebounding advantage. Tuma finished with 17 points, while Justin Stovall added 14 points and 11 rebounds. Logan Pearson added 12 points, while Quentin Shields and Jack Huml had 11 points apiece.
Tuma was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player, and was joined on the All-Tournament Team by Shields, Pearson, Stovall, Bolwerk and Northland College's Simon Palmer.
