With hopes of a Big Ten Tournament bid still uncertain, Northwestern entered Tuesday’s contest at Minnesota in search of rare consecutive road victories.
Before tip-off, the Wildcats (15-13, 6-11 Big Ten) found themselves among the bottom three teams that would miss out on a trip to the conference tournament if the season ended immediately. The Golden Gophers (14-14, 6-11 Big Ten) hovered just above that cut line.
Coach Chris Collins’ injury-riddled squad responded to the challenge, as a dominant second-half showing propelled it to a 75-63 victory.
Junior forward Nick Martinelli led all NU scorers with 29 points.
Riding the coattails of its recent blowout win over Ohio State, NU raced out to a quick double-digit lead before the hosts leveled the score at 21 midway through the first half. But behind Martinelli and graduate student guard Ty Berry’s combined 19 points in the opening 20 minutes, the ’Cats managed to get to the break up five.
After intermission, NU roared out to another dominant scoring run to start the second half similarly to how it started the first.
Redshirt sophomore forward Luke Hunger —who hadn’t scored since the team’s Jan. 26 loss to Illinois — chimed in with eight points in the victory.
The ’Cats outscored their opponents 39-32 in the second half as the Golden Gophers never came closer than nine points in the contest’s final minutes.
Here are three takeaways from NU’s road win over Minnesota:
1. Martinelli puts on a second-half show
As the Big Ten’s leading scorer, Martinelli proved once-again that he can be the end-all, be-all in terms of NU’s success.
Of the ’Cats 39 total second-half points, 19 came from the hands of the 6-foot-7 forward as he steamrolled towards his seventh 25-plus point scoring night of the season.
Martinelli scored more points than Collins’s four other starters combined Tuesday, frequently connecting with freshman guard K.J. Windham, who recorded seven assists on the night.
2. NU rides a back-and-forth first half
By just about two minutes into the game, the ’Cats already led by double-digits, converting their first four shots from the field – including two threes — and blanking the Golden Gophers on the defensive end — forcing three turnovers on opening possessions.
But when Minnesota forward Parker Fox knocked down a layup with 7:04 left to play in the first half to knot the score at 21-apiece, a once-silenced home crowd suddenly had reason to get loud after an 8-0 run erased what had been a promising NU advantage.
But Collins’s group refused to relent as Martinelli immediately responded with a 3-pointer to put the visitors back on top and put himself in double-digit scoring.
As younger players like Windham began to chime in with made-shots of their own, NU reached halftime with a 36-31 lead.
3. A first-half 3-point barrage
In the ’Cats most recent blowout win over Ohio State, they made just two of their 14 attempts from beyond the arc. In the game before that, they made 7-of-20 against Nebraska.
By intermission Tuesday they were shooting 58.3% on long-range attempts as five unique players knocked down first-half triples, with Martinelli and graduate student guard Ty Berry each hitting two.
Though NU made just two treys in the second half, its first-half momentum from deep helped propel it to victory.
Email: audreypachuta2027@u.northwestern.edu
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