UW-La Crosse (20-6) advances to face UW-Whitewater in a semifinal round matchup on Thursday (Feb. 24) in Whitewater. UW-Oshkosh concludes its season with a 17-9 record.
Both teams traded free throws to open the extra session before UW-La Crosse went up 64-62 on two free throws by Joe Werner. UW-Oshkosh's Jim Capelle ied the game with two free throws before Luke Homan gave the visitors another two-point lead at 66-64 on two more charity tosses.
The Eagles went up by 68-64 after a dunk by Werner coming off of a steal. Werner, however, was assessed his second technical foul of the game on the play, thus, eliminating him from the contest. Following the technical foul, Capelle drained two free throws to cut the Eagles' lead to 68-66.
Another free throw by Capelle closed the Titans' deficit to 68-67 with 1:24 left in overtime. From there UW-La Crosse missed two free throws and Capelle missed a three-point attempt. After a foul by the Titans, Joe Bemis canned one free throw to give the Eagles a 69-67 advantage.
Following an offensive foul on Capelle, the Titans fouled Bemis and he made one of two attempts from the charity stripe to give the Eagles a 70-67 lead. Jahnke's three-point attempt at the buzzer rimmed out, letting the Eagles escape with the victory.Other than the dunk by Werner, every point scored by both teams in overtime came from the free throw line, including all six points by UW-Oshkosh's Capelle.
The Eagles forced overtime when Marcus Conigliaro connected on three free throws with two seconds left in the game after being fouled on a three-point attempt. The Titans could not get a shot off at the end of regulation as the teams battled to a 61-61 deadlock after 40-minutes of play.
After holding a 33-28 lead at intermission, UW-La Crosse held its biggest lead of the game 36-28 when Conigliaro started the second half with a three-point bucket. Down again by eight points 38-30, UW-Oshkosh went on an eight point run to tie the game at 38-38. Knotted again at 42-42, UW-Oshkosh stormed ahead 53-46 on a 11-3 scoring streak with 8:37 left to play.
UW-La Crosse's Chris Ask answered with a three-point basket that ignited a 10-0 run that gave the Eagles a 56-53 advantage with 4:58 left on the clock. With UW-La Crosse ahead 58-57 at the 3:20 mark, neither teams scored for 2:07 until Capelle put UW-Oshkosh up 59-58 on a lay-up. After a turnover by UW-La Crosse, Capelle canned two free throw giving the hosts a 61-58 advantage with 30 ticks left on the clock before Conigliaro's heroics put the game into overtime.
Similar to the second half, Conigliaro started the first stanza with a three-point bucket to start the game. UW-Oshkosh would go up 7-5 before two free throws by the Eagles' Timothy Owens tied the score at 7-7. From there UW-La Crosse would lead for the last 12:52 of the first half, with its biggest lead being 29-22 with 3:12 left on the clock.
Capelle led all scorers with 27 points. He set a pair of WIAC Tournament records by making 19 free throws in 23 attempts Capelle added a team-best seven rebounds. Jahnke chipped in 13 points, Kerry Gibson nine points and six blocked shots and Wesener seven points and six rebounds.
Conigliaro led the Eagles with 20 points, including five three-point baskets. Werner added 12 points and eight rebounds, while Bemis came off the bench to score 14 points.
UW-Oshkosh finished the night shooting 36.6 percent (19-52) from the floor, 23.1 percent (3-13) from the three-point line and 83.9 percent (26-31) from the charity stripe. UW-La Crosse ended the contest shooting 42.6 percent (23-54) from the field, 40 percent (8-20) from beyond the arc and 69.6 percent (16-23) from the free throw line.