Bulldogs Turn It Around

by Jordan Haarer

After a tough loss at Milwaukee, The Bulldogs turned things around on Friday night against Cleveland State by dominating on defense, holding the Vikings to 56 points and 34% field goal shooting. After the game, Cleveland State’s coach, Gary Waters, said “I have to give Butler all the credit tonight. They came ready to play and they whooped out butt. They took it to us from the start, and got us out of our flow on offense and defense.”

Hinkle Fieldhouse was almost sold out and the crowd was roaring. Butler played stifling defense, holding the Vikings to 7 points over the first 10 minutes of the game. The turning point was when Cleveland State was called for an intentional foul as Matt Howard drove for a layup on a fast break. From that point on Butler dominated. The Vikings kept chucking up threes which greatly helped Butler’s cause. On the other hand, the threes kept falling for the Bulldogs in the first half. They finished the half 5-9 from beyond the arc.

If it wasn’t for Norris Cole, Cleveland State’s star guard, Butler’s margin of victory would have been even bigger. He scored 46% of his teams points. Cole finished with a double-double. 26 points and 10 boards. He was 8-17 from the field. 3 of his 8 field goals were from beyond the arc.

Butler’s star for the game was Andrew Smith. He too had a double-double. Chipping in 22 points towards Butler’s cause. Another stat that stands out was his 5 offensive rebounds. After the game, Andrew Smith said, “(Cleveland State’s) bigs helped off a lot and our guards did a really good job of penetrating, and they got me the ball a lot. I was able to get some offensive rebounds and make some shots.”

This 76-59 victory was very important to Butler. It was a huge momentum builder. They recovered from a devastating loss to an average Milwaukee team, and they ran one of they biggest conference rivals out of the gym. Brad Stevens said’ “I thought we did a really nice job of defending as a team and attacking as a team. You have to handle their initial wave in order to attack them approiatley, and i thought our guards did a great job of that and our bigs did a great job of finishing.”