By Justin Kies
The University of Nebraska at Omaha men’s basketball team took the floor twice this past week, when they hosted the summit league leading South Dakota State Jackrabbits on Valentine’s day, and the Purdue Fort Wayne Mastodons on Feb. 16.
All three teams are currently fighting for the top seed in the upcoming conference tourney but Omaha seemed to have made a statement this past week with two huge conference wins. Despite trailing 13 points at the half against SDSU, the Mavericks were able to contain the Jackrabbits’ two-headed monster in David Jenkins and Nebraska native Mike Dahm for most of the second half.
Thursday night’s game included Baxter Arena’s biggest crowd ever for a home basketball game, and on the biggest stage yet, senior Mitch Hahn drained a fade-away baseline jumper with 0.2 seconds remaining to edge the Jackrabbits 85-84.
Two days later on senior day, the Mavs hosted a red-hot Purdue Fort Wayne team who was on a five-game win streak, and they were trying to avoid a hangover loss from Thursdays dramatic win.
UNO only trailed five points at the half with senior Zach Jackson only tallying 3 points during that span. However, Jackson and company would start pouring it on in the second half and after a couple of big time shots, the Mavericks would secure another huge conference win.
“It’s just, sometimes that happens, you just get in the zone and I was trying to be as aggressive as I could and try to give my team a boost of energy to get us up ahead of this team,” said Jackson.
UNO has yet to lose in the month of February, and will host Western Illinois before finishing the season with three straight road games.
