“It was a great win,” said head coach Gary Grzesk. “The first half both teams played really well and in the second half we bumped our intensity up a little bit. At this time of the year every game is important. We want to keep pace with MSOE and continue to get better. I think we took a step forward tonight.”
Sophomore Kris Saiberlich continued his hot shooting of late as he went 7-12 from behind the arc on his way to a 27 point performance.
“I think the main thing is I was struggling earlier in the year and I really wasn’t shooting like I usually do,” said Saiberlich. “A lot of it is more shots in the gym after practice. I think a lot of the credit goes to my teammates. I’m not going to get an open look unless one of my teammates creates something for me. Aaron (Regal) and Germayne (James) did a great job penetrating and than pitching out tonight.”
Senior Nick Howard also scored in double figures for Lakeland has he added in 11 points, going 4-5 from the field and hitting two free throws. The Muskies shot 49 percent for the game.
Lakeland held Concordia’s two leading scorers, senior Matthew Peets and junior David Lipanot, to just nine points on the evening, well below their season averages. The Muskies held the Falcons as a whole to just 35 percent shooting for the game.
“Last game Nick Howard did a great job on Lipanot,” said Grzesk. “He came out with the same intensity tonight and did a really good job on him. He scored nine points but he had to work really hard to get those nine. Our post defense on Peets was a lot better this time around. The big thing on him is we wanted to limit his touches and he had a great game against us the first time around. The guys had a good focus on trying to take them away and making other guys beat us.”
The crowd was into the game from the very beginning as the Muskies improved to 9-1 in the Lake Michigan Conference and 16-4 overall.
In an environment like tonight it makes it easier to get up for the game,” said Saiberlich. “When you have fans yelling like they were tonight it was the best crowd we’ve had all year. When you have a crowd like that it is easy to get up for games.”
The Muskies will wrap up their three-game home stand on Saturday when they face Dominican at 4:15 p.m. Dominican is currently sitting in third place in the LMC.