Two missed threes and a turnover. They will show up as miscues in the box score on the part of junior guard Brett Olson, because you have to count them. That is how it works. But if you know the real story—a desperation three with the shot clock winding down and a long inbounds pass as time was expiring—it becomes even harder to find fault with Olson’s play Saturday night.
Olson had a career-high 30 points on a 64-percent shooting night against his father’s alma mater and played a near flawless game to lead the Pios past the University of South Dakota by a score of 75-67 last Saturday afternoon. It was the first time a player has scored 30 points since Nov. 11, 2011, when former Pio guard Brian Stafford had 32 against Portland State University.
“I took a couple peeks at the scoreboard, I heard the fans chanting ‘Brett wants 30,’ and then when they fouled me at the end, I just laughed and said ‘I guess I’ll get it,’” Olson said. “We’re just trying to play good overall basketball, not really caring about score count, but whenever I’m able to help I mean, it’s a good feeling.”
Olson, a Colorado native, was also perfect at the line, hitting all six of his free throws, and was 4-for-4 from beyond the arc at halftime, and went on to go 6-of-8 on the game from three land.
DU dropped the team’s previous meeting in January, losing 54-59. With the win, the Pioneers improve to 12-11 overall and 5-3 in the Summit League (fourth place).
“We’re playing really well, building 15, 17 point leads,” head coach Joe Scott said. “We have to sort of get better at desperation time. Sometimes desperation time is when you have a big lead. We were better at it today, we were better at keeping a big lead.”
Tied at 11 apiece with 10:36 left in the first half, Olson had nine of the team’s next 11 points to help the Pios hold a slim 22-18 advantage with 7:05 left.
Momentum seemed to shift the way of the Pioneers for good as sophomore guard Jalen Love capped off a seven-minute, 16-6 run for the Pios in exciting fashion. Love launched a shot a near center court as the buzzer sounded to end the first half and hit nothing but net. DU went into the half with their largest lead of the night, up 38-26.
The Pios led by as many as 17 in the second half, a lead that was too great for the Coyotes to overcome. South Dakota came within six with 17 seconds left, but it was too little too late.
Senior forward Chris Udofia complemented Olson’s career night by tying his own season-high in blocks with five. Junior guard Cam Griffin nearly had the double-double, posting 14 points and 9 rebounds.
“[You need to] get yourself to the point where you play well every game and maybe the one thing you don’t do great that night is make shots,” Scott added. “You defend, rebound, play good defense, take care of the basketball. That’s sort of what I see in our guys, they’re all playing well, and enough of them make shots that night.”
The Pios have begun the second half of conference play, and will take on Indiana University-Purdue University (IUPUI) next Thursday. The teams’ previous meeting at Magness proved to be a 66-45 win for the Pios. IUPUI has not won a Summit League game, and sit at 5-21 overall.
