Tigers Lose NCAC Battle For Third Place To DePauw

Wittenberg falls into a tie for third place in conference standings with one game left in the regular season.

Cam Walton was honored before the Tigers' 70-62 loss to DePauw as the team's lone senior. Photo by Erin Pence
Cam Walton was honored before the Tigers' 70-62 loss to DePauw as the team's lone senior. Photo by Erin Pence
February 13, 2013
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SPRINGFIELD, Ohio – The Wittenberg men's basketball team missed a golden opportunity to lock up third place in the 2012-13 North Coast Athletic Conference (NCAC) regular season standings with a 70-62 loss to visiting DePauw.

The visiting Tigers secured the season sweep of Wittenberg, and more importantly, DePauw is now in the driver's seat for the No. 3 seed in next week's NCAC Tournament. The two sets of Tigers now have matching records of 15-9 overall and 8-7 in the NCAC, with DePauw returning home to close out the regular season against nationally ranked Wooster and Wittenberg facing a road trip to Hiram, where the Tigers haven't won since 2008.

Wittenberg jumped out to a 5-0 lead to start the game, but DePauw battled back to take a 22-15 lead with 7:13 left in the first half. After the host Tigers responded with another 5-0 burst, DePauw put together perhaps the most important run of the game, outscoring Wittenberg 10-0 over the final 3:15 to take a commanding 32-20 lead into the locker room at halftime.

The lead swelled to as many as 20 points in the second half as Wittenberg continued to scuffle offensively. Over the final 14 minutes, the host Tigers finally found some amount of offensive rhythm, aided by DePauw's struggles from the free throw line.

The visiting Tigers made a paltry 13-of-28 free throw attempts in the game, including 8-of-18 in the second half. That allowed Wittenberg, which shot a scorching 65.2 percent from the field over the final 20 minutes, to pull as close as seven points in the final 47 seconds.

For the game, the host Tigers shot 51.2 percent, compared to 53.2 percent for the visitors. Wittenberg held a three-rebound advantage, but the host Tigers did themselves no favors with 17 turnovers, compared to just nine for DePauw.

Individually, junior Zack Leahy (Rossford, Ohio/Rossford) led the way with 20 points, followed by junior Scott Masin (New Carlisle, Ohio/Bethel) with 14 points and five rebounds and senior Cam Walton (Waterville, Ohio/Anthony Wayne) with 12 points, three assists and a game-high nine rebounds.