Box Score Doug Thorpe scored eight of his team-high 20 points over the final three minutes to lead No. 11 Wooster to a 78-73 win over the Denison Big Red from Livingston Gym.
Denison gave the Scots all they could handle and showed supreme resiliency after surviving a vintage 12-0 run by Wooster late in the second half. That run turned DU's two-point deficit into 12 heading into the break.
Wooster would maintain a sizeable lead in the first five minutes of the second half until a 3-pointer by David Meurer woke up the home crowd and got DU to within six at 52-46. Wooster's Xavier Brown would counter with a layup with 14:30 to play, but that would be the final field goal for the next five minutes. During that span, Denison would go on a 14-2 run to take a 58-56 lead with 10:07 to play.
It would be a 3-pointer by Denison's Robby Weingart that put the Big Red on top, but 19 seconds later, Brown would end the Scots' drought with a 3-pointer of his own, putting his team back up 59-58 with 9:48 left.
Over the next seven minutes the two teams would trade off the lead and with 3:53 to play, Brad Woolard's free throw marked the eighth tie game situation of the contest. A Wooster turnover followed by a Denison miss would open the door for Thorpe to begin to heat up.
His personal run would start with a 3-pointer off a pass from Kenny DeBoer with 2:54 to play. Denison would miss the front end of a one-and-one, and trailing by three with 1:21 to play, Weingart was whistled for an offensive foul while trying to gain space to attempt a shot. The ball was given back to the Scots who ran the shot clock down to single digits before putting it in the hands of Thorpe. The senior knifed to the rim and finished, putting his team up five with just under a minute to play.
On Denison's ensuing possession, Weingart's 3-point attempt was off the mark, but Woolard was there to corral the rebound and his put-back was good, making the score 73-70 in favor of Wooster with 38 seconds left.
Denison's Alex Longi, who became the 20th player in school history to score 1,000 career points in the first half, was called for a foul with 32 seconds remaining. Thorpe went to the line and canned both pressure-packed free throws to go up five and put the game away.
The Big Red's grit was on full-display as they got the best of what the 11th ranked Scots had to offer. Longi led all scorers with 22 points to go along with seven rebounds and three assists in 37 minutes. He was 10-for-13 from the field and 2-of-2 from the free throw line. He has scored 1,016 points in his Denison career and needs just three points to move into 19th on the DU all-time scoring list.
Weingart came off the bench to score 14 points while going 3-of-7 from beyond the arc. Woolard finished with 13 points, four assists and five rebounds.
The two teams were nearly identical from the field as Wooster connected on 28-of-55 attempts for 51 percent. Denison shot 47 percent by going 29-for-62. The difference came at the charity stripe where the Fighting Scots connected in 16-of-19 while Denison hit 8-of-9.
Thorpe paced Wooster with 20 points off a 7-for-14 shooting performance. Brown followed with 19 points and DeBoer added 14 points, nine rebounds and seven assists.
Wooster improves to 18-3 and 12-2 in the NCAC while Denison drops to 10-11 and 6-8 in conference play. The Big Red will return to the court on Wednesday (Feb. 12) with a critical NCAC contest at Kenyon College. The Lords currently sit fifth in the NCAC standings with a 7-7 record while Denison trails by one game at 6-8. The game at Kenyon will tip-off at 8 p.m.
