BOX SCORE
MOORHEAD, Minn. - MSU Moorhead received 20 points each from DJ Hamilton and Charlie Chapman to collect a 91-83 victory over Augustana Wednesday night in the opening round of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference/Sanford Health Men's Basketball Tournament.
MSUM improves to 19-8, while Augustana falls to 17-10.
The Dragons will advance to the semifinals where they will play No. 1-seeded Bemidji State at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday in Rochester, Minn.
The Vikings, who were No. 9 in today's Central Region rankings, will now wait to see if they are selected for the NCAA tournament during Sunday's selection show. The Dragons were ranked eighth.
MSU, which fell to Augustana this past Friday, shot 54.0 percent (28 of 51) in the win and drained 13 of 23 3-pointers (56.5 percent). The Dragons' lead was as large as 13 points twice in the second half.
Cody Schilling became Augustana's all-time leading scorer with a 28-point effort. He passed Carl Gonder's career mark of 1,830 points and now has 1,853 points as a Viking.
Drae Murray scored 21 points, and
Cameron McCaffrey added 15 for the Vikings, who shot 19.1 percent (27 of 55).
It took Augustana more than five minutes to hit its first field goal of the game, and the Viking were down 6-0 before Murray broke the dry spell with a layup at the 14:12 mark.
The Dragons led for the next 10 minutes.
Alex Richter gave Augustana its first lead of the game when he drilled a 3-pointer to put his team ahead 25-24. MSUM responded with six unanswered points and eventually built its advantage to 39-31 by halftime.
Schilling poured in 12 first-half points for the Vikings.
Early 3-pointers by Hamilton and Andrew VanHavermaet gave MSUM its first of two 13-point leads in the game a little more than two minutes into the second half. The treys put the Dragons ahead 47-34.
The Vikings quickly rattled off seven unanswered points to trim the difference to six points.
Five minutes later, Augustana had it down to a three-point deficit after five-straight points from Murray. MSUM's Jake Driscoll came up with a timely 3-pointer in response.
The Vikings again had it within three points with 7:31 to play, but another Dragon 3-pointer--this one from VanHavermaet--followed.
MSUM grew its advantage to 10 points with 3:15 to go and to 13 points with 33 seconds remaining.
The Dragons' 56.5-percent performance from behind the arc was their second best outing this season.
Augustana is now 0-4 all time in NSIC Tournament games.
Sunday's NCAA tournament selection show will be streamed at NCAA.com. The Vikings have made nine postseason appearances in program history.
