UNI men’s basketball holds off Evansville with clutch free throws

CEDAR FALLS — Clutch free throw shooting helped send Northern Iowa past Evansville in a Missouri Valley Conference men’s basketball game at McLeod Center Tuesday night, 70-63.

Kyle Pock’s 3-pointer with 3:36 remaining gave the Panthers a 60-55 lead. It was also the last field goal UNI (12-8, 6-3) made as the Purple Aces sent the Panthers to the free throw line six times as the clock wound down.

After having the fortune to slip past Southern Illinois last Saturday night in a similar scenario — making just six of 14 late-game free throws — UNI converted nine of its 12 free throw attempts against Evansville, making for a slightly more comfortable win.

“That’s more like the team we have,” UNI Coach Ben Jacobson. “It tells you they’ve been putting in a lot of work. That they didn’t think about it or certainly overthink it from what happened on Saturday. If you haven’t put in the time, if you haven’t put in the work and you end up back in that same situation it’s going to bother you. This reinforces that they’ve put in a lot of time.”

Despite not having leading scorer Ben Humrichous, the Purple Aces routinely hit timely shots throughout the game and had answers for UNI scoring runs that opened each half.

After an 11-2 run in the first half, Evansville (11-9, 2-7) outscored the Panthers 29-17 over the last 14:49 to enter halftime with a 31-28 lead.

A 10-0 run by UNI to begin the second half was quickly brought back to a one-possession lead by Evansville with a 3 from Kenny Strawbridge and a Yacine Toumi jumper.

In the second half, though, the Panthers never lost their lead despite the Purple Aces getting within one possession six separate times.

Jacobson pointed out that not over-adjusting was important at halftime and throughout the second half.

“With the iPads now and the technology, the access to it, you can get through all the possessions (at halftime),” Jacobson said. “We had the ball down on the block (and) we got it out of there clean. We had some open 3s. Now, the one adjustment that we did need to make — we had four or five times where we got the ball right to the rim and we got no points out of it. In terms of the scheme, in terms of over-adjusting, you gotta fight that a little bit because we’ve got good shooters.”

Toumi led all scorers with 20 points and was joined in double figures by Chuck Bailey III and Tanner Cuff, who scored 14 and 13 respectively.

Nate Heise and Tytan Anderson each scored a team-high 15 points for the Panthers and Anderson added 10 rebounds for his first double-double of the season. Bowen Born joined the duo in double figures with 14.

“I think the way we started the second half (was important),” Heise said. “They made some timely shots, but it always felt like we were in control, mostly due to our defense.”

UNI returns to action Saturday at Drake (16-3, 7-1). Tipoff at Knapp Center is at 5 p.m. (ESPN+).