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Micah Thomas follows the flight of his tiebreaking 3-pointer against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi on Tuesday. Credit: Southland Conference. Facebook Twitter WhatsApp SMS Email Print Copy article link Save LAKE CHARLES – With one look from his fellow Northwestern State guard Jon Sanders II, Micah Thomas knew he had an opportunity to push the Demons into the Southland Conference Tournament semifinals at the Legacy Center.
And push he did. Thomas’ wide-open transition 3-pointer with 17.3 seconds remaining lifted the No.
4 seed Demons over fifth-seeded Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, 66-63, and into their third tournament semifinal in the past five seasons. “When I saw Jon grab that rebound, he gave me a look,” Thomas said. “I sprinted.
I put my head down and got ready to shoot.” Thomas’ shot was the 12th made 3-pointer for the Demons (16-15), who advance to play No. 1 seed McNeese in Tuesday’s 6 p.
m. semifinal. It also came after the Islanders (20-14) had erased a 10-point halftime deficit when Dian Wright-Forde split a pair of free throws with 1:13 to play.
Thomas’ game winner was the final punch in a back-and-forth second half that saw the Islanders continually whittle down the Demons’ lead only to see Northwestern deliver repeated counter punches. The Islanders started the second half on an 11-3 run that cut the lead to two before Love Bettis’ personal 5-0 run made it a three-possession game. Bettis finished with a team-high 17 points – 12 of which came in a first half where the Demons connected on 7 of 11 3-pointers.
Three of those came in a game-opening 11-0 run in the first 118 seconds of the game. “I was a little bit in awe,” second-year head coach Rick Cabrera said. “They scored those 11 points off defense.
I don’t know if I called a play. They got stops, pitched the ball ahead, found Landyn (Jumawan), found Micah, found Love (Bettis). I was in shock, but trust me, I was in a good mood.
” Northwestern’s first-half lead grew to as much as 16 points before the Islanders launched their comeback, which hearkened back to the 2023 SLC Tournament championship game in the same building. In that game, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi erased a 16-point first-half deficit to claim the tournament crown. It appeared it would happen again, but the Demons were able to short-circuit enough Islander runs to keep that from repeating itself.
“We knew Corpus was going to make a run,” Cabrera said. “Good teams cut the run a little shorter than others. We did that.
They never took a lead. We just figured it out. I’m all about the Jimmies and Joes, and our Jimmies and Joes were good tonight.
The credit goes to them.” Few were better early than Bettis, who scored the game’s first five points. Bettis also added three assists and hit all four of his free throws without committing a turnover.
“It’s March,” Bettis said. “Teams are going to go on a run. We anticipated that.
We sat down and played defense. When that happens, everything else will come.” Thomas’ shot was made possible by a wild sequence that saw Willie Williams challenge a potential go-ahead layup by Wright-Forde before grabbing the rebound and flipping it to Sanders, who found Thomas for the game-winning bucket.
The carom was the final of Williams’ game- and career-high 13 rebounds, which included six of Northwestern’s 11 offensive rebounds. “Willie’s a great competitor,” Thomas said. “He plays hard every night.
We don’t question that. A lot of my 3s come from him getting offensive rebounds. That’s a credit to him and a credit to the whole team for playing hard.
” Next up for the Demons is a third meeting of the season with the regular-season champion Cowboys. “The elephant’s in the room,” Cabrera said. “They’re a very good team.
We were down four points here with four minutes to go. We had a lot of self-inflicted wounds down the stretch. We know we can win the game, but we have to do more of the right things.
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