MCMINNVILLE, ORE. – Freshman
TreyVaughn Bierlink hit his first career game-winner on Friday night to pull the Linfield men's basketball team across the finish line for a 61-60 win over Pacific Lutheran.
"TreyVaughn played a great all-around game, he's a talented freshman who's just scratching the surface of how good he will be. The game-winner was nice too," said head coach
Shanan Rosenberg after the win.
A defensive battle throughout, Linfield (5-7, 2-2) led for almost the entirety of the game before a late push from the Lutes (6-6, 0-3) forced the Wildcats to make big plays in the final moments.
"We were fortunate to win, but we also did many positive things tonight in a physical game," said Rosenberg. "We have been ravaged by injuries this year; I'm proud of all our guys for continuing to fight and believe despite a ton of adversity. It's a credit to the quality of men they are."
The Wildcats established early control by playing one of their best defensive halves of the season through the first 20 minutes of action, holding the Lutes without a field goal and to just three points from the 10:24 mark until halftime.
"Our defense and rebounding were excellent in the first half. That was nice to see," said Rosenberg.
Linfield held PLU to just 24 percent from the field and 2 for 12 on three-point attempts in the first half and won the first half rebound battle 19 to 15.
A buzzer-beating three from sophomore
Trey Bryant to cap the first half put Linfield up by 17, the Wildcats' largest lead of the game, heading into the locker room.
But Pacific Lutheran immediately showed resiliency in the second half with back-to-back three-pointers from Jackson Reisner to trim the deficit to 11.
Linfield still led by double-figures for most of the second half, even leading 58-46 with just 4:21 left to play.
From there PLU clamped down on defense to rip off a 12-0 run, with eight of those points coming in the paint from forward Brandon Riedel. The Lutes gained just their second lead of the night on a breakaway layup by Jordan Thomas to cap the run and make the score 60-58, their first lead of the game since the score was 5-3.
Out of the timeout, Linfield struggled to find room to operate, but off an offensive rebound the ball ended up in the hands of Bierlink, who managed to bank in the shot from three to put Linfield in front, 61-60, with 2.6 seconds remaining.
With an offensive foul on Pacific Lutheran on the inbound play, the ball went back to the Wildcats to hold on for the win.
"Give PLU a ton of credit for really playing hard and well to come back after being behind the whole game," said Rosenberg. "We gave them too much help, but they made great plays down the stretch."
Bryant led Linfield with 18 points on 7 for 14 shooting with two made three-pointers, four rebounds and four assists. Bierlink followed with 13 points on 5 for 8 shooting with three three-pointers in 20 minutes off the bench.
"I thought
Trey Bryant was pretty special tonight in all phases. That was important for our team and him," said Rosenberg.
For the game Linfield shot 39.3 percent from the field and 40.9 percent (9 for 22) from three, in addition to going 8 for 13 on free throws.
Pacific Lutheran shot 35.4 percent from the field and were held to just 27.3 percent (6 for 22) on three-pointers, with an impressive 87 percent mark from the free throw line, where they hit 20 of 23 attempts and 16 of 17 in the second half.
The Wildcats also scored 18 points off of 16 Lute turnovers and got 25 points from their bench to PLU's 13.
The win snapped a three-game losing streak for Linfield and three-game win streak for PLU. Linfield is now 3-2 in their home of Ted Wilson Gymnasium.
NEXT
Linfield will have a chance to bring its overall record back to .500 next weekend, as the Wildcats travel to Portland to play Lewis & Clark (7-5, 1-2) on Friday, Jan. 13 at 8:00 before hosting Puget Sound (9-3, 2-1) on Saturday at 6:00.
Linfield's meeting with the Loggers will kick off a run of five straight games at home for the 'Cats.