Cardinals prepare for upcoming Las Vegas Tournament

J.P. Bartmess
2/17/12

Basketball has one of the longest seasons of any sport here at William Jewell College. For four months straight, both the men’s and women’s basketball teams at Jewell live and breathe basketball almost every day. Now both teams are into the final two weeks of the season and looking to finish strong in conference.
“It has been important as the season has gone on to trust each other. Staying together as one team and take pride in everything you do. This [transition] year has brought some struggles, but you have to bring it every night in [NCAA] Division II and it has only gotten us better,” Nick Larson, senior, said.
Last night the men’s and women’s teams took on Drury University at the Mabee Center on Larry Holley Court. In the women’s game, runs were made by both teams back and forth throughout the game. Drury ended the game on a 30-6 run and defeated the Cardinals 62-50. Cassy Nicolay, sophomore, had 17 points and 9 rebounds for the Cardinals. After the women’s game, the men’s team took the court looking to avenge a 23 point loss to the Panthers last month. In double overtime, the Cardinals fell again to the Panthers 88-84. After one of their players made a three-pointer from half court to send the game into a second overtime, the Panthers went perfect from the free-throw line and put the Cardinals away. Larson led the way for the Cardinals with 21 points and 9 rebounds.
This past week, the men’s and women’s teams traveled to Illinois for a pair of road conference games. On Saturday, both teams fell to Quincy University. The women’s team fell 78-51 and was led by Nicolay with 17 points. On the men’s side, the Cardinals committed 20 turnovers and lost 76-65 to the Hawks. Craig Mattson, junior, and Larson each had 17 points to lead the Cardinals in scoring.
“We needed to get off to a better start. They made a huge run at the beginning of the game and we just couldn’t fight back. Everyone needs to be working on the defensive side because we feed off each other on that end, and we lost focus a lot on Saturday,” Holly Switzer, junior, said.
On Thursday, both teams were in Springfield, Ill. for some Great Lakes Valley Conference action against the University of Illinois-Springfield. The women’s team won 64-60, thanks to 19 points apiece from Chelsea Meeks, sophomore, and Switzer. However, the men’s team fell 78-63 after the women’s game. Chris Uz, senior, led the Cardinals with 13 points.
“I got into foul trouble early and that hurt us. We shot poorly, but needed to find a way to get some buckets and keep some motivation going for the team to give us a chance in the second half,” Larson said.
While the men’s team is sitting with a record of 7-15 overall and 4-12 in GLVC play, the women’s team has a shot to win the western division of the GLVC with a 13-9 overall record and 8-8 in the GLVC. They were a preseason pick to finish last in their division. However, since both teams cannot participate in the conference basketball tournaments this year, they will travel to Las Vegas next weekend to participate in the Vegas D-II Shootout.
“We went there three years ago and it was a lot of fun. It is a cool way to end our season and everybody is excited for the trip. While it will be fun, we want to go prove that we do belong in [NCAA] Division II and can play with anyone,” Switzer said.
The Cardinals can make a statement with two games left in the regular season. Both teams travel to Rolla to take on the Miners of Missouri S&T tomorrow and then finish out the season on Thursday, Feb. 24 at home.
“Our goal is to win the rest of the games we play, no matter who we are playing. That was our goal at the beginning of the season and nothing will change that. We need to get better every day between now and Vegas so we can finish what we started,” Larson said.