• Boxscore & Play-by-Play

SEATTLE – Tom Whitehead capped his tournament MVP performance with 17 points Saturday, helping the Dixie State men defeat 10th-ranked Seattle Pacific 68-61 in the final game of the Sodexo Tip-Off Classic at Brougham Pavilion.

Dixie (3-2) was the only one of the four tournament teams to win both games. The Red Storm were 86-80 victors over Western Washington on Friday behind 21 points from Whitehead.

SPU (1-1) lost despite the 17 points of senior point guard Chris Banchero (Seattle, Wash./O'Dea HS), who was named to the all-tournament squad along with sophomore teammate Andy Poling (Portland, Ore./Gonzaga).

Rory Blanche of Western Washington and Mark Samuels of Cal State East Bay rounded of the all-tournament team.

Ryan Sweet's dunk with 2:42 left in the game ignited a 9-0 Falcons' spree. Jeff Downs capped the run with a 3-pointer at 0:50 that cut the deficit to 64-61.

"We did a good job hanging in there and fighting back," said second-year SPU coach Ryan Looney. "At the same time, we need to do a better job of valuing the importance of team play, especially in a big game like tonight."

Dixie secured the win by netting the final four points of the game, all of them by Maurice Cole. He hit a critical runner in the lane, was fouled and sank the subsequent free throw to extend the margin to 67-61 with 18 seconds remaining. Cole also hit one of two free throws with 10.8 seconds left.



Griffon Jones scored 15 points for the Red Storm and Solomon Jensen added 10. Dixie shot 49 percent for the game (28 of 57), including a torrid 57 percent (12 of 21) in the second half.

"Dixie did a great job tonight. Their team was extremely well coach and they executed very well on the offensive end of the floor," Looney remarked.

He was not so complimentary to his own team's offense.

"We were pretty selfish. If you look back to just a night ago in the second half, we ran our stuff on the offensive end really well, shot over 60 percent from the floor and scored a ton of points. Our scoring was really balanced.

"Tonight I'll bet I could count on one hand the amount of times we actually got multiple ball reversals within offense. That led to a poor shooting night."

The Falcons were limited to 37-percent shooting (21 of 57), one night after hitting 61 percent of their field goals in a 102-62 win over Cal State East Bay.

Downs (Kirkland, Wash./Bellevue Christian HS) scored 13 point for SPU, which also got 12 from Sweet (Port Orchard, Wash./South Kitsap HS).

Dixie's explosive first half was the difference as the teams played to a 31-31 standoff after halftime.

SPU went ahead 6-5 early on back-to-back layups by Banchero and Sweet.

Dixie scored 13 unanswered points, getting baskets from five different players to take the lead for good at 18-6 with 12:49 left in the first half.

The Red Storm held a 25-11 advantage before SPU staged a 14-2 run to draw within 27-25 with 4:00 to go in the half. Banchero keyed the surge with six points and a pair of assists.

Dixie closed the period with a 10-5 run to stake a 37-30 halftime lead.

The teams traded baskets for most of the second half with neither putting together more than two consecutive scores until the late run by the Falcons.

The SPU men return to action next weekend in Phoenix, Ariz. at the GCU Thanksgiving Classic. They play Fort Lewis on Friday at 1:15 p.m. before clashing with host Grand Canyon on Saturday at 6:15 p.m.


NCAA Men's Basketball
Sodexo Tip-Off Classic
Saturday, Nov. 20, 2010
Brougham Pavilion/Seattle, Wash.

SODEXO TIP-OFF CLASSIC ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
MVP -- Tom Whitehead, Dixie State
Chris Banchero, Seattle Pacific
Andy Poling, Seattle Pacific
Rory Blanche, Western Washington
Mark Samuels, Cal State East Bay

DIXIE STATE 68, SEATTLE PACIFIC 61

DIXIE STATE (3-2)
Whitehead, Tom 6-12 4-4 17; Jones, Griffon 7-10 1-1 15; Jensen, Solomon 5-7 0-0 10; Massey, McKay 3-6 0-0 7; Plunkett, Donovan 3-7 0-0 7; Cole, Maurice 2-3 3-4 7; Barnes, Jeremiah 2-5 0-0 5; Owen, Derek 0-2 0-0 0; Araujo, Everton 0-3 0-0 0; Clegg, Landon 0-2 0-0 0. Totals 28-57 8-9 68.

SEATTLE PACIFIC (1-1)
Banchero, Chris 5-18 7-8 17; Downs, Jeff 5-12 0-0 13; Sweet, Ryan 6-7 0-2 12; Poling, Andy 3-8 1-2 7; Anderson, Jake 0-2 4-6 4; Moll, Kellan 1-2 0-0 3; Morse, Scott 1-5 0-0 3; Downs, David 0-1 2-2 2; Dorman, Jeff 0-2 0-0 0. Totals 21-57 14-20 61.

Dixie State.................... 37  31 --   68
Seattle Pacific............... 30  31 --   61

3-point goals--Dixie State 4-12 (Plunkett, Donovan 1-2; Barnes, Jeremiah 1-2; Whitehead, Tom 1-3; Massey, McKay 1-3; Clegg, Landon 0-2), Seattle Pacific 5-23 (Downs, Jeff 3-9; Moll, Kellan 1-2; Morse, Scott 1-4; Anderson, Jake 0-1; Downs, David 0-1; Banchero, Chris 0-6). Fouled out--Dixie State-None, Seattle Pacific-None. Rebounds--Dixie State 31 (Jensen, Solomon 7), Seattle Pacific 36 (Poling, Andy 8). Assists--Dixie State 17 (Cole, Maurice 5; Barnes, Jeremiah 5), Seattle Pacific 15 (Banchero, Chris 6). Total fouls--Dixie State 19, Seattle Pacific 16. Technical fouls--Dixie State-None, Seattle Pacific-None. Att.-491.