DE PERE, Wis. – After an unbelievable 71-70 upset victory over No. 3 University of St. Thomas on Friday night, Northwestern (19-9) returns to the Schuldes Sports Center on the St. Norbert College campus on Saturday as a member of the remaining 32 teams in the NCAA Division III Tournament. The Eagles play Elmhurst College with tip-off scheduled for 7 p.m.
NCAA Tournament Bracket: PDF | Interactive
Game Links: Live Video | Live Statistics
St. Norbert Pool Announcement | Northwestern NCAA Tournament Announcement
How they got here:
Both of Friday's games on St. Norbert's campus were highlight reels. Northwestern beat St. Thomas on Porter Morrell (Elk River, Minn./Home School)'s buzzer-beating three-point basket. The Eagles, who led by as much as 11 in the first half, were up 63-62 with 1:50 to go on a layup by Matt Watnemo (Moorhead, Minnesota/Moorhead High School), but the Tommies reclaimed the lead on a pair of free throw before pushing their advantage to 66-63 on Grant Shaeffer's runner with 41.8 seconds to play. The two teams traded free throws before UNW's Cody Sprenger (Grey Eagle, Minn./Long Prairie-Grey Eagle) tied it with a three-pointer with 13 seconds left. Shaeffer scored again on a contested lay-up with 6.2 seconds left to give St. Thomas a two-point lead, but Morrell's three-pointer went in as the buzzer sounded to advance the Eagles to Saturday night.
Elmhurst and St. Norbert, the fifth-ranked team in the D3Hoops.com Top 25 poll, needed three overtime periods to settle their score, with the Bluejays from Elmhurst winning 110-98 after 55 minutes of play. In addition to facing a raucous St. Norbert crowd, Elmhurst was the team who was seemingly always having to play from behind in regulation and the first and second overtimes.
Will Nixon delivered the Bluejays' first clutch bucket at the end of regulation. Trailing by two with just seconds left on the clock, Eric Leonard had the ball knocked away in the lane but Nixon scooped up the loose ball and scored to send the game in overtime.
St. Norbert (25-2) led by three with just 6.6 seconds left in the first overtime, but Wuest ran the length of the floor and buried a three-pointer with a defender in his face to force a second overtime.
Crittenden came up with the clutch bucket in the second overtime, hitting an off-balanced jumper in the paint with 4.2 seconds remaining. The Bluejays dodged a bullet at the end of the second overtime as St. Norbert's D.J. DeValk drove the length of the floor, but his potential game-winning layup came just after the buzzer.
NCAA Tournament Notes
Elmhurst's triple-overtime game against St. Norbert was the seventh NCAA Division III Tournament to go into a third extra period, marking the first time since 2007 that such an event has taken place. No Division III postseason contest has gone four overtimes.
Three of the top five teams ranked in the latest D3Hoops.com poll – No. 2 Wis.-Whitewater, No. 3 St. Thomas, No. 5 St. Norbert – fell in the NCAA Tournament first round on Friday, with three more Top 25 teams (Nos. 14, 16, 18) also taking an early exit from the postseason.
Updated Northwestern Notes (See original NCAA Tournament notes packet here.)
Friday's win is Northwestern's 17th straight, a number that continues to be a program record. The victory over St. Thomas is easily the Eagles' top win in its 41-year history in terms of ranking. UNW has never defeated a top-five ranked team.
Morrell's buzzer-beater from Friday was ESPN SportsCenter's No. 4 highlight on the program's nightly Top 10 plays reel. Between Facebook and Twitter, the game reaction received over 55,000 social media impressions in 12 hours.
Matt Watnemo (Moorhead, Minnesota/Moorhead High School) went 6-6 shooting on Friday for 13 points. The senior has made 60.8 percent of his overall attempts this season.
Michael Carney (Ames, Iowa/Des Moines Christian) needs 14 points to eclipse 1,000 points for his career. Fellow junior Caleb Janson (Pierz, Minnesota/Pierz Healy) is at 484 career rebounds after Friday's game, needing 16 to get to 500.
Northwestern's four turnovers in Friday's game versus St. Thomas matched a season-best for the Eagles. The other game in 2014-2015 featuring only four UNW mistakes was Feb. 28th's UMAC Tournament championship against Minnesota Morris.
Northwestern and Elmhurst have never played in the two teams' history, meaning Saturday's meeting will be the first bout between the Eagles and Bluejays.
Elmhurst Notes (Courtesy of Elmhurst Sports Information)
Elmhurst (20-7, 9-5 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin) reached the NCAA Tournament via an at-large berth after taking third place in the CCIW.
Nationally, the Bluejays rank 20th in rebounding margin (+7.7), 23rd in free throw attempts (645), and 35th in free throw percentage (.746). Elmhurst comes into tonight's contest with a 4-5 record against teams in the NCAA Tournament. They lost to Augustana twice, went 1-2 against Illinois Wesleyan, and defeated Dubuque before the win over St. Norbert on Friday. Elmhurst was nationally ranked this season, ranking as high as 16th in the D3hoops.com poll. Head coach John Baines is in his second year at the helm and has led a 13-game turnaround in his brief tenure. He is 33-18 in two seasons and has more victories in his first two years than any other coach in Elmhurst history.
Key Elmhurst Players to Watch:
G Kyle Wuest (6-1, 185, Jr., Edinburgh, Ind.)
Wuest (15.0 points per game) is the leading scorer for the Bluejays. He ranked fourth in the CCIW in scoring, averaging 16.8 points in conference play. He checks in at second in assists (54), steals (21), and third in rebounding (4.9) for the Bluejays and earned first-team all-CCIW honors.
F/C Will Nixon (6-7, 210, Jr., Plainfield, Ill.)
Nixon was a second-team all-conference selection, while manning the post for Elmhurst this season. He averages 8.4 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 1.38 blocks per game. In conference play, he ranked third in the CCIW in rebounding (7.0), fifth in blocks (1.29), and led the conference in offensive rebounds (2.64).
G Bryant Ackerman (6-2, 195, Jr., Loogootee, Ind.)
Ackerman earned third-team all-CCIW honors this season and scored double-digit points in each of Elmhurst's last five regular season games. After averaging 9.4 points in non-conference action, the Elmhurst guard shined in conference play, ranking 13th in the CCIW with 11.8. He leads the Bluejays with 55 assists on the season and also grabs 4.0 rebounds. Twice this season Ackerman hit game-tying shots in the final seconds of regulation to force overtime (January 29 vs. Augustana and February 14 vs. North Central).
Elmhurst in De Pere, Wis.: Elmhurst owns a 3-2 record when playing at St. Norbert.
