Coyote men prepare for Summit League Tournament
Last Thursday’s win over IUPUI guaranteed USD a spot in the Summit League Tournament. The Coyotes took down the Jaguars 85-82, but followed it up with a 76-90 loss to Western Illinois.
Senior guard Casey Kasperbauer said the Coyotes got the victory when it mattered.
“We came into the IUPUI game knowing that it was a must-win for us. Take care of business right away, early on in the week, rather than wait until Saturday,” Kasperbauer said. “Luckily we got it done Thursday because we kind of slipped up and took a step backward on Saturday.”
The win allowed the Coyotes to secure a place in the tournament.
“At the end of the day if you’re good enough to be in the tournament, you get in the tournament. If you’re not, you don’t,” Coyote head coach Craig Smith said. “All you can do is control what you can control. We were able to do that at IUPUI.”
The Coyotes now sit as the eighth seed in the Summit League Tournament and will take on No. 1 seed Fort Wayne in the first round. The Mastodons swept the season series with the Coyotes. Fort Wayne won the first game at home 85-65 and took the game in the DakotaDome 95-82.
A big part of the Mastodons’ success is senior guard Max Landis. Landis scored 44 points in the second game against the Coyotes and shot 11-15 from three-point range. Smith said the first step in defeating Fort Wayne is limiting Landis.
“They probably have the player of the year in Max Landis,” Smith said. “He had 44 against us last time out, so we’re going to have to do a better job of containing him in every way, shape and form.”
Despite the difference in seeding, the Coyotes are confident they can still make something happen.
“We’re still confident in what we can do, we’re still confident we can beat them,” Kasperbauer said. “I think this time around will be a different result.”
There is reason for confidence. The Coyotes are 4-4 since playing Fort Wayne and are now healthy. Sophomore forwards Tyler Flack and Austin Sparks are now back in the lineup, which gives the Coyotes some much-needed support in the front court. Flack and Sparks are now one and two on the team’s field goal percentage leaders.
“We’re 4-4 in our last eight games and prior to that we were 1-7 in our previous eight games,” Smith said. “I feel like we’re trending upward, but we’ve got to play our best here at the end of the year, which is what we’ve talked about all year long.”
The Coyotes will play their first game of the tournament against Fort Wayne Saturday at 6 p.m. in the Denny Sanford Premier Center in Sioux Falls. Games will continue at the Premier Center all weekend and into the week, with the championship on Tuesday night at 8 p.m. The winner of the tournament will receive an automatic bid in the NCAA Tournament.
“They (the players) believe we can do it, we all believe we can do it,” Smith said. “Now we’ve just got to go and do it.”
