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Traveling trophies stay put at MUM

Miami Middletown men, women sweep games against Miami Hamilton.

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1:13 AM Thursday, February 2, 2012

By John Bombatch

Staff Writer

MIDDLETOWN — The men’s and women’s basketball traveling MUM-OX-MUH trophies didn’t have far to go on Wednesday.

Host Miami University Middletown successfully defended both trophies with wins over Miami Hamilton, in front of a large C. Eugene Bennett Center crowd.

The MUM women broke a 59-all tie when Brianne Thornton scored the final bucket of her game-high 21 points with 40.9 seconds left in the game. Lela Colvin hit one of two free-throw tries with 34.3 seconds left to play, but the Harriers couldn’t muster another score.

MUM’s Kristen Washington blocked Miranda Alsept’s last-second try, snared the rebound and was fouled with 0.1 of a second still left on the clock to seal the win. MUM is now 12-6 overall and 8-1 in the Ohio Regional Campus Conference’s West Division.

“We had to play as a team, use solid defense. Just play with a total team effort, basically,” Thornton said. “We told ourselves just to come out in the second half and play tougher defense.”

Hamilton (10-8, 6-4 in the ORCC West) reeled off a 7-0 run to grab a 31-28 lead at halftime, but an 11-2 ThunderHawks run midway through the second half put MUM on top for good.

“Time ran out on us, and we were one point behind when the clock stopped,” said MUH coach Chris Settle. “I told them they weren’t losers, that’s for sure. They played their butts off and we’ve got three weeks to play and then maybe we’ll see them in the postseason. We ain’t done yet.”

Alsept and MUH teammate Brittany Fernandez led the Harriers with 13 points each.

MUM rolled to a 94-72 win in the men’s game. Several players were sprawled about the Bennett Center Gym floor with cramping issues in that game. MUM athletic trainer Ed Carlisle said the combination of a warmer-than-normal evening, an up-tempo contest between league rivals and maybe a lack of proper hydration by both teams, may have led to Wednesday’s cramp fest.

“I’d never seen anything like it,” said MUH coach Dwayne Terry said. “We were prepared for them. There was nothing that they did that we didn’t expect or that we didn’t prepare for in practice, but (MUM) was just more athletic tonight.”

Starters Akeem Freeman (11 points), Dexter Robinson (15), Lamar Mallory (18), Max Zukowitz (17) and Shawn Robinson (16) scored in double figures for MUM (19-3, 12-0), and Richard Weaver came off the bench to score 11 points.

Mallory tied MUH’s Ameche Okafor and Will McCray for top scoring honors with 18 each, but Mallory also had 10 rebounds.

“It’s like an Ohio State-Michigan game where both teams played extremely hard. Sooner or later, somebody had to cramp up,” said MUM point guard Robinson. “Just good things happened for us today.”

Speaking of Ohio State, MU Hamilton will host Ohio State University-Lima, and MU Middletown will host OSU-Mansfield on Saturday for a pair of men’s and women’s contests.

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