3 days Ago By TOM JOHNSTON [email protected]
With roughly a minute left in the first half of Wednesday’s men’s basketball game at Carver Center, the hosting Augustana Vikings and Knox Prairie Fire were playing pinball with the basketball, trying to get a handle on a loose ball. At one point, all five Vikings were on the floor, diving and crawling trying to gain possession. Late in the contest that had already been decided, the deep Viking reserves were still diving on the floor for loose balls.
“That’s something we have to keep doing,” said fifth-year Viking Tyler Knuth. “That’s how you break away in these types of games and stay in the games when they are close.” There were very few instances when Wednesday’s non-conference game was close.
Augie’s 113-65 runaway victory was all but decided by halftime when the Vikings led 60-29. The 113 points were the most in a regulation game for the program since scoring 123 against a run-and-gun Greenville squad in 2018. The victory also snapped a two-game losing streak for the Vikings – both of those coming in CCIW play.
“Outside of a couple of poor starts to both halves, I thought we really imposed our will and were the aggressors all night long,” said Augie coach Jordan Delp. “We tell our guys all the time that there’s no coverage solution for blowing things up and I thought we took them out of what they wanted to do tonight and didn’t allow them to be comfortable in anything they wanted to do. That’s how you turn a team over 25 times.
” In addition to forcing those 25 Prairie Fire turnovers that the Vikings turned into a 31-2 advantage in points off turnovers, Augie held a 39-31 rebounding edge that became 25 second-chance points and a 21-point edge in that category. Augie (6-3) also enjoyed a terrific shooting night, finishing 56.8% (42 of 74) from the field and 47.
8% (11 of 23) from the 3-point line. Knuth led that charge in a couple of ways. Not only did he hit 4 of 5 triples en route to a game-high 23 points, but dished off 6 of Augie’s 19 assists that came from 11 players.
“We kept moving and kept cutting,” said Knuth. “That was the big thing. We didn’t watch the ball handlers.
That second cut was always open and we just kept moving.” The hosting Vikings got off to a sluggish start in the contest, falling behind 7-3. A quick 13-2 spurt, though, set the tone for the rest of the evening as it was all Augie after that.
That deciding run started with Chase Larsen (8 points) getting a nice feed from Knuth. Ray Maurchie (10 points, 7 rebounds) was the recipient of more open looks underneath with three buckets in the paint. Knuth hit a triple and Larsen bookended the spree with another bucket at the rim.
The Vikings added points in bunches in moving the lead to 34-14 before the midway point of the first half. The Vikings finished with four players in double digits as playing time was dispersed by everyone in uniform. Evan Ambrose added 16 points and Matt Hawkins 10 to go with 9 from Anthony Cooper on 3-of-6 shooting from beyond the arc.
Big man Nikola Raic added 8 points. In all, 14 of the 15 to play cracked the scoring column, including varsity points for local preps Jake Willems (4) and Maddux Dieckman, who split late free throws. Sean Gallery led Knox (2-8) with 15 points as the Prairie Fire suffered their sixth straight loss.
Tyler Knuth Augustana scored 113 points en route to an easy nonconference home win Wednesday night. Get local news delivered to your inbox! sports writer/golf editor {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items..
