University of Minnesota Athletics
Gophers Rally, Beat Big Red
12/6/2008 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
The Minnesota men’s basketball team overcame a 12-point half-time deficit to beat Cornell 71-54 Saturday afternoon at Williams Arena and stay perfect on the 2008-09 season.
The Gophers, 8-0 and off to their best start since the 1976-77 season, outscored the Big Red 43-14 in the second half to secure the victory.
Junior shooting guard Lawrence Westbrook went 3-of-5 from three-point range and paced the Gophers with a team-high 17 points. Junior forward Damian Johnson added 11 points, four assists and two blocks in 19 minutes. Freshman big man Ralph Sampson III added 10 points to go along with six rebounds and junior forward Travis Busch chipped in eight points in the win.
Ryan Wittman, a First-Team All-Ivy selection in 2007-08 and the 2006-07 Ivy League Rookie of the Year, paced Cornell with 21 points.
Led by 16 first-half points from Wittman, the son of Minnesota Timberwolves head coach Randy Wittman, Cornell an NCAA Tournament team from a season ago - took a 40-28 lead into the locker room.
But once the Gophers picked up their intensity to start the second half, Cornell - which also held a double-digit first half lead at No. 20 Syracuse on Wednesday night before falling to the Orangemen - had no answer to the Maroon and Gold's attack.
Implementing a full-court trap and executing Tubby Smith’s ball-line defense to near perfection, Minnesota forced 10 Cornell turnovers in the second stanza and held the Big Red to 19.2 percent shooting (5-of-26 from the field and 0-of-13 from three-point range) to rally back from the deficit.
“We just picked up our defensive intensity,” Westbrook said. “We all played hard and it raised each others’ level of intensity.”
After a back-and-forth start to the game, which included four ties and two lead changes, Cornell held the Gophers without a field goal for 3:35 and, with Wittman firing on all cylinders, the Big Red closed the half on a 16-5 run to take a double-digit lead into the locker room.
Asked by coach Tubby Smith at half time to collectively pick up their defensive intensity, the Gophers responded emphatically.
Using a lineup combination of Al Nolen, Devoe Joseph, Westbrook, Johnson and Sampson III, the Gophers changed the games’ momentum with pressure defense. Down 46-33 after sophomore shooting guard Blake Hoffarber exited with an ankle injury, the Gophers harassed Cornell's offensive unit and went on a 13-0 to tie the game, 46-46. Moments later, the Gophers took their first lead of the second stanza, 49-48, when a Nolen steal led to a transition layup by Westbrook. And, after holding the Big Red without a field goal for 6:35 Minnesota’s run eventually ballooned to 25-2 as a mid-range jumper by Busch gave the Gophers a 10-point lead, 58-48, with 5:09 left in regulation.
Minnesota outscored Cornell 13-6 in the final five minutes, leading by as many as 19 to complete the turnaround.
“It was a good win for us," Smith said. "We knew Cornell was a very formidable opponent."
