Sophomore guard Anders Nelson’s 14 points led the No. 5 St. Thomas men’s basketball team to a 64-35 win over MIAC opponent Macalester College (4-4 overall, 1-2 MIAC) Wednesday evening at Schoenecker Arena.
The Tommies (6-1 overall, 2-0 MIAC) improve their win streak to five straight matches on the season.
“I thought we didn’t start quickly, but I thought Macalester played really well to start,” St. Thomas coach John Tauer said. “More than anything we always talk about bringing energy, we talk about getting energy from our defense and I thought it was one of our better defensive performances this year.”
The Tommies started out the game slow, scoring a mere 12 points in the first 10 minutes of the game with Macalester leading 16-12.
Nelson said that the team realized “something needed to change” at that point in the game.
“Tauer told us to kind of just believe in our ability, and we went out on the court and just played our game,” Nelson said.
The Tommies outscored the Scots 18-5 to end the first half and 34-14 in the second, turning the game into a blowout.
St. Thomas slowly improved throughout the game, a trend that Tauer was hoping would happen.
Nelson took the helm for the Tommies in the second half, leading the team in both rebounds and points.
“We did a terrific job of defending and we showed how we can work together as a team. We featured a lot of subs tonight and the depth on our team shows how good every player is on this team,” Nelson said.
St. Thomas is one of two schools in all three NCAA divisions to have both its men’s and women’s basketball teams ranked in the top 10 this early in the season. Louisville University is the only other school.
“Our women’s team is a tremendous program, and we have the utmost respect for them and across all 22 sports,” Tauer said. “It’s special and unique, and I think that’s a great representation of both programs.”
The Tommies host Gustavus Adolphus at 1 p.m. Saturday at Schoenecker Arena for more MIAC regular season action.
Jacob Schneider can be reached at schn6923@stthomas.edu.