GREELEY, Colo. -- Northern Colorado got a go-ahead jumper from Jordan Davis with 10 seconds to play to pull out a 71-70 victory over North Dakota in men's Big Sky basketball action Saturday at Bank of Colorado Arena.
The Fighting Hawks (10-10, 5-4 BSC) had one last look in the closing seconds, but Quinton Hooker's runner in the lane was off the mark.
The Bears (8-13, 5-4 BSC) won their fourth straight and pulled even with UND in the league standings. The loss snapped a three-game road winning streak for the visiting Hawks.
Colorado native Drick Bernstine led UND with a career-high 21 points and scored 11 of those in the closing five minutes in a back-and-forth affair. He finished 10-for-14 from the floor and added a team-high seven rebounds.
Unfortunately, this was the second-straight nailbiter in Greeley for the Fighting Hawks, who also lost by a point in the regular-season finale a season ago (72-71).
Davis' game-winning basket was the final one of a second half that saw the teams exchange nine leads and be tied on nine different occasions. Davis and Anthony Johnson, who had a key 3-point play in the closing minute, shared the team-lead for the Bears with 17 points apiece.
Hooker added 12 points for UND as he reached double figures for the 25th-straight game. He put UND up 68-65 with a putback at the 1:26 mark, but the Bears got four straight before Bernstine gave the Fighting Hawks' one last lead.
“We gave ourselves a chance and that is hard to do on the road in this league,” UND head coach Brian Jones said. “This was a battle and we knew it would be. We just needed to execute one more time after they did, but that was a tough way to see this one end.”
UND opened the game on a 7-2 run, but the Bears responded with an 8-2 run of their own to take their first lead of the game.
Davis gave UNC the lead back at 14-12 on a jumper at the 11:36 mark, but that would be the home team's final advantage of the opening 20 minutes. Adam McDermott capped a quick a 5-0 run for UND with a transition 3-pointer to give the momentum back to the visitors.
The Fighting Hawks would push their advantage to a first-half peak of nine on two occasions late in the stanza, but Wilson would trim UNC's deficit back to six at 40-34 with his deep 3-pointer at the halftime buzzer.
Junior Corey Baldwin had all 11 of his points in the first half for UND, including five straight at one point as all nine Fighting Hawks that played in the opening 20 minutes scored. He went 3-for-4 from beyond the arch as UND knocked down 4-of-9 form distance and shot 50 percent from the floor.
The Bears regained the lead on a deep two-pointer by Wilson at 45-44 and opened the second half on a 14-4 run that set up a wild 15 minutes of back-and-forth basketball.
Freshman Conner Avants had eight of his 10 points after halftime to reach double figures off the bench for the fourth straight game for UND.
UND returns home to play Idaho State on Thursday and start the second half of Big Sky play. Tip-off is set for 7:05 p.m. CT.
-- UND --
