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ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A month ago, the Alaska schools started Seattle Pacific's brief decline. Now, they have assisted in the Falcons ascent.
 
Mitch Penner tallied 24 points and converted three free throws during the final 27 seconds Saturday to secure SPU's 74-71 men's basketball victory over Alaska Anchorage at the Alaska Airlines Center. The two teams are now tied for second place in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference standings with matching 9-3 records.
 
The Falcons (16-4) extended their winning streak to seven games by sweeping the two-game Alaska road trip for the fourth consecutive season. They had not accomplished that feat in their previous 10 visits to Alaska.
 
Anchorage (16-7) entered the week tied for first place, but lost twice to drop into the second-place tie.
 
The SPU men staked their largest lead of the game, at 63-47, on a 3-pointer by Brendan Carroll with 8:05 left to play. They scored just two points during the next 5:22, enabling the Seawolves to draw within 65-57 on back-to-back 3-pointers rom Spencer Svejcar.
 
The Falcons lead was 70-59 before Anchorage reeled off eight straight points to close the margin to 70-67.

 

Penner halted the SPU drought, converting two free throws with 27 seconds remaining. After a jumper by UAA's Sekou Wiggs, Penner hit the second of two free throws for a 73-69 advantage with 9.3 seconds left.
 
Wiggs made a layup with 4.8 seconds on the clock, cutting the UAA deficit to 73-71, but Bryce Leavitt sealed the win on two free throws with 2.3 remaining.
 
Penner hit 10 of 16 shots and added six rebounds and four assists.
 
The product of Seattle's Kennedy High School scored his 1,000th career point on Thursday. The 6-foot-5 senior forward now has 1,045 points to rank 30th among all-time SPU scorers.
 
"We used Mitch more at the four (big forward) this weekend than we have all year," said Coach Ryan Looney. "He was a mismatch problem for both teams. He impacted the game in a lot of ways. Mitch obviously scored, but he also defended well."
 
Carroll contributed 14 points for the Falcons, including 4-for-7 accuracy on treys. Gilles Dierickx added 13 points and red-shirt freshman Coleman Wooten a career-high 12.
 
Svejcar scored 23 points to lead the Seawolves, who also got 14 from Brian McGill. Wiggs finished with 15. The product of Seattle's O'Dea High School was held nearly nine below his league-leading 23.7-point average.
 
"We face-guarded Sekou everywhere and made all of his catches hard," Looney described. "We started out the game with Bryce Leavitt on him and when he got in foul trouble we put Brendan Carroll there, who also got in foul trouble. Then we went to Will Parker and he did the best job of anybody."
 
SPU shot 55 percent (28 of 51) and the Seawolves hit 47-percent of their shots (25 of 53). Both teams nailed 8 of 19 shots from 3-point range.
 
The current seven-game winning streak came immediately after SPU suffered through a three-game losing skid. Anchorage started that slide, coming to Seattle on Dec. 31 and ending a nine-game Falcons winning streak with a 61-59 win.
 
Then Alaska Fairbanks left Brougham Pavilion with a 79-75 victory on Jan. 2. The Falcons exacted their revenge over the Nanooks on Thursday with a 79-69 triumph. Penner scored 29 points in that game, giving him a 26.5-point average on the two-game trip.
 
SPU's third straight loss was a 96-90 overtime setback on Jan. 7 at Western Oregon, a team that visits Seattle next week.
 
"The whole time our goal has been to get ourselves back to how we were playing before Christmas break," said Looney, whose team sported a 9-1 record and No. 8 national ranking before disbanding for the holiday.
 
"We won nine straight games at that time, went on break and we relaxed. We got ourselves in a little bit of a tailspin and now we've just been fighting to get ourselves back to the level that we are at earlier in the year. I think we're finally there now."

 

The Falcons drained their opening four shots of Saturday's game, the first two on consecutive 3-pointers by Carroll, to go ahead 10-4 three minutes into the game. That margin eventually stretched to 25-16 on a dunk by Dierickx with 8:53 left in the first half.
 
Anchorage scored the next six points to narrow the gap. The SPU lead was 41-36 before the Seawolves Damien Fulp made a free throw with 23 seconds remaining and McGill dribbled the length of the floor for a layup at the halftime buzzer to bring the hosts within 41-39.
 
Both teams shot well in the opening 20 minutes. SPU posted 59-percent accuracy (16 of 27) and the Seawolves countered with 56-percent shooting (14 of 25).
 
Coming out of intermission, McGill made a layup to even the score at 41-41.
 
Penner answered with a 3-pointer and layup, igniting a 19-4 SPU spree. The Falcons made five straight shots during that stretch while holding UAA without a basket in 10 attempts.
 
The SPU men return home for a pair of games next week. They host Concordia (Ore.) on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. in the nightcap of a Brougham Pavilion doubleheader with the women, who play at 5:15 p.m.
 
"We're just going to rest as much as we can after this trip and then all of our focus will be on Concordia," said Looney. "We know down the stretch that we have to take it one at a time because every game is just as important as the next one."
 
Next Saturday, SPU hosts first-place Western Oregon at 7 p.m. The Wolves are the defending conference regular-season champions while the Falcons won the last three GNAC Tournaments.
 
 
NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL
Saturday, Jan. 30, 2016
Alaska Airlines Center / Anchorage, Ak.
 
Seattle Pacific 74, at Alaska Anchorage 71
 
SEATTLE PACIFIC (16-4, 9-3 GNAC)
Penner 10-16 3-6 24, Swanson 0-2 0-0 0, Dierickx 5-9 3-4 13, Leavitt 1-1 1-2 3, Carroll 5-8 0-0 14, Wooten 5-6 0-1 12, Rasmussen 1-3 2-2 4, Colosimo 1-3 0-0 3, Parker 0-2 1-3 1, Betu 0-0 0-0 0, Simpson 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 28-51 10-18 74.

ALASKA ANCHORAGE (16-7, 9-3 GNAC)
Thompson 1-1 0-0 2, Hammell 0-3 5-6 5, Wiggs 6-15 2-3 15, Svejcar 8-13 2-2 23, McGill 5-9 3-4 14, Fulp,Damien 3-7 1-2 7, Leckband 2-5 0-0 5, Pearson 0-0 0-0 0, Peterson 0-0 0-0 0, Parrish 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 25-53 13-17 71.
 

Seattle Pacific...............   41   33  -   74
Alaska Anchorage..............   39   32  -   71

3-point goals--SPU 8-19 (Carroll 4-7, Wooten 2-2, Colosimo 1-2, Penner 1-3, Parker 0-1, Swanson 0-2, Simpson 0-1, Rasmussen 0-1), UAA 8-19 (Svejcar 5-7, Wiggs 1-5, Leckband 1-2, McGill 1-3, Hammell 0-1, Fulp 0-1). Fouled out--SPU-None, UAA-None. Rebounds--SPU 30 (Dierickx 8), UAA 26 (Hammell 8). Assists--SPU 20 (Leavitt, Penner, Carroll 4), UAA 15 (McGill 6). Total fouls--SPU 21, UAA 20. Technical fouls--SPU-None, UAA-None. A-1050.


Next SPU Men's Basketball Game
Concordia (Ore.) at Seattle Pacific
Thursday, Feb. 4, 7:30 p.m. PST
Brougham Pavilion / Seattle, Wash.