Oklahoma State holds off upset-minded St. Thomas

Marchelus Avery scored 23 points on 8-of-12 shooting, while Pat Suemnick and Bryce Thompson added 11 points apiece to lead Oklahoma State over St. Thomas 80-71 on Sunday in Stillwater, Okla.

The upset-minded Tommies were down 40-33 with 15 minutes remaining until a 7-0 Cowboys run in a 47-second span gave them a 14-point cushion they ultimately wouldn't relinquish. Consecutive 3-pointers brought St. Thomas back within eight points with 6:30 remaining, but Oklahoma State was able to keep it at bay for the remainder of the game.

Avery, Suemnick and Thompson were the only Oklahoma State players to score more than eight points. Suemnick shot 5-of-6 from the field. Arturo Dean led Oklahoma State with nine rebounds and five assists.

St. Thomas' leading scorer Miles Barnstable was held to just six points in the contest and didn't make his first field goal until there was 6:49 remaining. St. Thomas was led in scoring by Kendall Blue with 18 points, followed by Drake Dobbs, who had 14.

St. Thomas went up 6-2 in the first three minutes of the game but went scoreless over the next 5:19, allowing Oklahoma State to take a 12-6 lead with 12:28 remaining in the first half. Oklahoma State made it a 17-2 run to take a 19-8 lead just past the 10-minute mark.

St. Thomas subsequently answered with a 10-0 run of its own that brought the Tommies back within a point. They started their rally by making three consecutive field goals, including back-to-back 3-pointers by Carter Bjerke, while forcing the Cowboys to miss eight straight shots from the field during that stretch.

The Cowboys answered with a 9-0 run that saw St. Thomas go into another lengthy scoring drought over a span of 3:50, falling behind by double digits again until a technical foul by Suemnick sent the Tommies to the line to cut the lead to 28-20. The Tommies couldn't keep the deficit to single digits before the break and went to halftime trailing 33-23.

Oklahoma State shot 27-of-60 (45 percent) from the field, including 6-of-22 (27.3 percent) from 3-point range. St. Thomas outshot Oklahoma State from behind the arc, making 15 triples on 36 attempts (41.7 percent) but went just 25-of-62 (40.3 percent) from the field overall.

--Field Level Media