John Sutherland's buzzer-beater powers Bemidji State over UMC

Dec. 2—BEMIDJI — John Sutherland couldn't believe how open he was.

The Bemidji State men's basketball forward was searching for a spot in the paint to receive an entry pass as the seconds ticked down in the Beavers' matchup with Minnesota Crookston. And lo and behold, he got his shot.

Sutherland established position inside, then point guard BJ Davis somehow found him while simultaneously falling down onto the ground. Sutherland made the catch and converted the layup with 0.4 seconds left, giving BSU a dramatic come-from-behind 63-62 win over the Golden Eagles.

"BJ drove around the corner," recounted Sutherland, who led all scorers with 26 points overall. "My (defender) left me, and I had a wide-open layup, so I made it."

According to head coach Mike Boschee, the play didn't go as planned, but the synergy between Davis and Sutherland gave Bemidji State a chance to execute regardless.

"BJ just stayed under control," Boschee said. "We obviously had to go quickly (down 62-61 with eight seconds left). We had a call on where he was actually supposed to go to the right side, but there was all kinds of traffic in there. So he broke it off, went to the middle and everybody sucked to him. But Sutherland was still in the right spot, and he dropped it off for the layup."

Before any heroics came into play late in the game, the Beavers (6-2, 2-0 NSIC) had to dig out of an eight-point deficit early on. They cut the gap to three at the half, but UMC (3-5, 0-3 NSIC) didn't concede any ground easily.

"We just have to lock in on defense and fight hard, because we always seem to get smacked in the face right away, and then we've got to play from behind," Sutherland said. "Which I guess we don't mind, but obviously, we don't want that. So we've got to come out faster next time."

Boschee admired the way BSU responded to the early adversity, but he too wouldn't have minded if the Beavers had simply burst out of the starting gates.

"It's hard," Boschee added. "It challenges you mentally, but our guys just stayed with it. We kept on getting better defensively. Early on, we couldn't guard our shadow. But as the game wore on, we got better and better and got a little more fight to us, and certainly, that was the difference."

Bemidji State struggled from 3-point range all night, converting just 7 of 25 attempts. While the Beavers did manage to make some headway inside, especially with Sutherland, Boschee hopes that BSU won't struggle through too many nights shooting 28% from deep.

"(Getting inside is) a huge part of it," Boschee said. "But for us to reach our potential, we need to continue shooting those 3s. Sutherland's really talented, Dalton (Albrecht)'s really talented inside, but we need (other) guys to be able to step up and knock down those shots. We can't turn them down, or else that'll just get worse for Sutherland in there.

"If we don't knock them down, they'll have four guys surrounding him, making (others) shoot wide-open shots. That's pretty much what we had tonight, and that's the disappointing part. We had really wide-open looks that we weren't knocking down."

All's well that ends well, though, and with Saturday's win, Bemidji State secured its first weekend sweep this season.

"We're coming together really well," said Sutherland. "We have very tough games coming (next) weekend, so we'll have to lock in and play well."

The Beavers will next travel to face conference co-leader Minnesota State Moorhead as well as Northern State, and Boschee hopes their 3-point shooting comes along for the ride.

"This league is so tough," he said. "Every team is a challenge, and you've got to be at your best to get victory. So we'll take this one, even though we didn't have our best."

Bemidji State 63, Minnesota Crookston 62

UMC 34 28 — 62

BSU 31 32 — 63

MINNESOTA CROOKSTON — Grant 23, Sagna 18, Deng 10, Hughes 4, Mitchell 4, Fuchs 3. Totals: 25-57 FGs, 8-23 3-pt. FGs, 4-7 FTs.

BEMIDJI STATE — Sutherland 26, Albrecht 10, Williams 10, Davis 8, Tennyson 6, Dayley 3. Totals: 25-64 FGs, 7-25 3-pt. FGs, 6-8 FTs.