Saturday, November 18
UW-Whitewater fell to Illinois-Wesleyan 69-68 in overtime in the championship game of the UW-Whitewater Tip-Off Tournament. Mike Toellner (sr, Mayville) led all scorers with a career-high 25 points on 7-11 shooting. Toellner also converted on all nine of his free throw attempts. Andy Freund (sr, Wauwatosa/West) contributed 12 points. Andrew Freeman (sr, Bloomington, IL) led the Titans with 18 points. Mike Harrigan (sr, Oak Lawn, IL) chipped in 16 points and Zach Freeman (sr, Bloomington, IL) grabbed 14 rebounds. The Titans out-rebounded the Warhawks 47-28.
The Warhawks built an 18 point lead in the first half to lead 34-16. The Warhawks forced the Titans into 18 turnovers in the first half and converted those turnovers into 22 points. The Warhawks went out to a 21 point lead early in the second half, their largest lead of the game, before the Titans began mounting a comeback. With 15 seconds left in the second period, Andrew Freeman hit a lay-up to tie the score for the first time in the game.
The Titans took their first lead of the game with 1:23 left in the overtime period on a free throw by Zach Freeman to make the score 67-66. Billy Kolinske (so, Big Bend/Catholic Memorial) hit a pair of free throws to give the Warhawks a 68-67 lead with 28 seconds left, but the Titans took the lead for good on a basket by Andrew Gilmore (so, Stillwater, MN) with 9 seconds remaining.
The Warhawks are now 1-1 on the season while Illinois-Wesleyan improved to 2-0.
In the consolation final, Martin Luther College defeated Clarke College 79-69. Caleb Free (fr, Plover) led Martin Luther with 22 points while Jake Schwartz (jr, Waterloo) had 20. DeMonte Bynum (jr, Milwaukee) had a game-high 23 points for Clarke and Demarvis Russell (so, Peoria, IL) had 17. Martin Luther is 1-1 this season while Clarke is 0-2.
UW-Whitewater’s next game will be Wednesday, November 22 at Marian College beginning at 7 p.m.