By Craig Pinley
CHICAGO, IL (December 9, 2001) – Both North Park University (NPU) basketball teams split games this weekend to stay at the .500 mark for the season.
The men’s team beat Northwestern College of Minnesota Friday at home by a score of 66-58 and lost 86-82 in overtime at Rockford College the following evening. The Vikings are now 5-5.
In the Northwestern game, Coach Rees Johnson emptied his bench in order to find a winning combination, using 14 players and getting points from nine of them in the first half as the Vikings took a 30-25 lead.
The Vikings continued to struggle to find an offense until the final moments as freshman Maurice Vaughn took over after Northwestern tied the contest 44-44 with 7:20 remaining. Vaughn scored on a three-point basket and made two foul shots as the Vikings scored eight consecutive points in a span of a minute and eight seconds.
After the visiting Eagles cut the lead to 61-58 with 49 seconds left, Vaughn made four straight free throws to ice the game. He had 21 points to lead NPU while John Reeves had 21 points for Northwestern College.
Against Rockford, however, Vaughn had just five points, his first game under 10 points in collegiate action. Jason Collins had 11 points and teammates Sneed Deaderick, Byron Pullen and Lamar Townsend added 10 apiece for NPU, which completed just 19 of 31 foul shots. Rockford (6-4) was paced by Maurio Beasley’s 17 points.
In women’s College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin (CCIW) play at North Park, the Vikings lost 64-52 to Millikin University and fell to 5-5 overall, 1-1 in conference play.
Maria Sanchez had 21 points for Millikin, which forced 32 North Park turnovers. The Vikings were led in scoring by Andrea Mendyk and Kristen Kern, who had 10 points each.
Last Thursday at Elmhurst College, Mendyk scored 19 points as North Park edged the Bluejays 48-46 in NPU’s CCIW opener.
Copyright © 2011 The Evangelical Covenant Church.