Senior guard Riley Miller led the St. Thomas men’s basketball team to a 73-53 victory over Division III Crown College with 22 points in its home premiere at Schoenecker Arena Thursday night.
The Tommies (4-4) are coming back from a busy road schedule, facing seven teams in four states over the past three weeks. The Storm (4-5) are the Tommies’ first Division III competition of the season.
“We talked before the game respecting every opponent, it doesn’t matter to Division I, II or III,” coach John Tauer said. “While we weren’t as good tonight in certain areas, a lot of credit Crown, I think they’re really well-coached and they know their identity.”
Miller found comfort behind the arc, hitting 7 of the Tommies’ 15 3-pointers of the game. In the first seven games, the senior guard has averaged 18.4 points per game while having a 46% 3-point shooting percentage.
“Hitting my first shot—yeah, I could tell I was going to be on tonight,” Miller said.
The Tommies’ first 15 points all came from 3-point shots, two from Miller and the others from graduate student guard Burt Hedstrom, senior guard Kevin Cunningham and senior guard Anders Nelson.
“I think we probably missed some shots that we normally don’t,” Tauer said. “But, five turnovers, we made 15 threes, there’s a certain way we’re going to play and the reality is we don’t get a lot of easy baskets around because we’re not the biggest team.”
Crown put up a fight in the first half, trailing the Tommies by just 10 points until the Storm’s 0-of-10 shots from beyond the arc did them in. However, the Storm found most of its points from rebounds, racking up 24 off of offensive rebounds.
St. Thomas continued pushing into the second half, ultimately leading Crown the entirety of the game.
The Tommies gained their first win of the Division I era at Schoenecker Arena, and Tauer says he could feel the support of being at home.
“We have really good students supporting and saw a lot of former players from last year tonight,” he said. “There was a certain excitement in the gym that we certainly are excited about.”
The Tommies take on Drake University, continuing their non-conference play at 2 p.m. Sunday in Des Moines, Iowa.
Olivia Paradise can be reached at para4336@stthomas.edu.