What If I Told You.....5,478 Days Later
What if I told you that a basketball team would reach the 100-point scoring mark in a game on the exact date 15 years later, against the exact same opponent and on the exact same night that the team was celebrating the life of one of the players that last helped the team get to the 100-point plateau?
MOORHEAD, Minn. (1/17/24)---Cue the ESPN "30 for 30" intro segment.
Narrator: What if I told you that a basketball team would reach the 100-point scoring mark in a game on the exact date 15 years later, against the exact same opponent and on the exact same night that the team was celebrating the life of one of the players that last helped the team get to the 100-point plateau?
That storyline sounds like it could only come from the mind of a Hollywood writer, but that's exactly what happened in Concordia's 100-58 win over St. Catherine on Wednesday, Jan. 17.
The last time the Cobbers reached the 100-point milestone in a game was on Jan. 17, 2009. The opponent that night? St. Catherine. And on that 2009 team was a sophomore guard named Jaynie Halvorson (Hebranson), whose life was being celebrated on Jan. 17, 2024, in the annual "Seize the Day" game after Halvorson died suddenly in a car accident in 2018.
All those strange coincidences came into play on Wednesday as Concordia scored at least 20 points in all four quarters and dropped 100 points on third-place St. Catherine in the 100-58 victory.
Not only were the finishing details eerily strange, the way the Cobbers earned their 100th point seemed to by something out of a fiction movie. CC led 97-58 in the final second of play and needed a 3-pointer to reach the 100-point milestone. Concordia wasn't going to take a 3-point shot with such a big lead, but got the ball inside to first-year post player Maci Wheeldon who went up for the layup. On a strange twist of fate, a Wildcat player fouled Wheeldon, which set up the opportunity for the conventional "and 1" to reach 100 points.
The gym suddenly went church quiet and Wheeldon stepped to the line. She proceeded to drain the free throw to get the 100th point and send the crowd into a frenzy.
The win was the fifth straight at home for the Cobbers and avenges their only home loss in the past two seasons. CC entered the night 16-1 in Memorial Auditorium with the lone defeat coming at the hands of St. Catherine last year.
Concordia is now 11-3 this season in all games and owns a 10-1 conference mark, which gives them sole possession of second place – three games a drift of a 3-way tie for third place.
The Cobbers earned their story-making win with the strength of their inside game. Concordia was able to get the ball in the paint area on a consistent basis, which led to a 53.7% (36-for-67) shooting percentage from the floor. They also outscored the Wildcats 56-16 in points in the paint for the game. The 56 points from around the basket is a season high and the +40-point margin in the stat category was also a season best.
The Concordia frontcourt quartet of Makayla Anderson, Greta Tollefson, Genevieve Gruba, and Wheeldon accounted for almost 50% of the team's scoring production. The four players scored 49 points, shot 65.5% from the floor and hauled down 16 rebounds.
Anderson had another monster game. She was 6-for-10 from the field and finished with 17 points and a game-high eight boards.
Tollefson went for nine points and four boards, while Gruba had a season-high 15 points and Wheeldon added eight points which included the historic "and 1".
Junior guard Carlee Sieben led all players with 18 points. She also added four assists and three rebounds.
The Cobbers continued their season-long trend of excellence at the free throw line. CC went 20-for-22 from the foul line and is now shooting an MIAC-best 82.0% for the season. That mark is also the best in all of NCAA Division III.
UP NEXT: Concordia will continue with its 4-game home stand when they host Bethel on Saturday, Jan. 20 at 1 p.m.
