Skip To Main Content
Skip To Main Content

University of Wisconsin - Stevens Point Athletics

OFFICIAL ATHLETICS SITE OF UW-STEVENS POINT
MCC_Champs
Keith Lucas
54
Augustana AUGIE 27-5
70
Winner UW-Stevens Point UWSP 27-5
Augustana AUGIE
27-5
54
Final
70
UW-Stevens Point UWSP
27-5
Winner
Score By Periods
Team 1 2 F
Augustana AUGIE 23 31 54
UW-Stevens Point UWSP 32 38 70

Game Recap: Men's Basketball |

Pointers secure fourth national title with 70-54 win over Augustana

SALEM, Va. – UW-Stevens Point used its signature stifling defense and a balanced offensive attack, featuring a barrage of three-pointers, to secure the fourth National Championship in program history with a 70-54 victory over Augustana College (Ill.) in the 2015 NCAA Division III title game.

Box Score | Madison.com Photo Gallery

After a close first nine minutes, UW-Stevens Point (27-5) went on a 12-0 run to take a 29-19 lead with three minutes left in the opening half. The Pointers would lead by at least seven points the rest of the way to defeat Augustana (27-5), as the team claimed its fourth national championship in the last 12 seasons and improved to 8-0 in Salem. UWSP is the fourth program to win four NCAA Division III Championships in men's basketball.

"I can't say enough about what this means to our basketball team, to our program, our university and our community," head coach Bob Semling said. "These guys have enormous expectations and this is the goal. This is why they come here. But this is their time, it's their mark, it's what they've added to the tradition of Stevens Point basketball."
 
Austin Ryf (Winneconne, WI/Winneconne) gave the Pointers a 22-19 lead with a three-point play during a stretch where UWSP hit five of eight shots from the field. Shortly thereafter, Stephen Pelkofer (Hales Corner, WI/Whitnall) hit UW-Stevens Point's fifth three-pointer of the opening half to gave the Pointers the largest lead of the half for either team, 32-21, with 2:21 remaining.
 
Ryf picked up where he left off in Friday night's semifinal win, scoring nine points in the first half, as UWSP shot 46.2 percent (12-for-26) in the first 20 minutes. The Pointers forced eight Augustana turnovers in the first half.
 
The Vikings came out of the locker room by scoring on their first two possessions but the Pointers then went on a 14-1 run to take a commanding 21-point lead, 49-28, with 13:05 remaining. Pelkofer hit two threes during the run, as UWSP put 17 points on the board in the first 6:55 of the second half.
 
Augustana responded with a 10-0 run of its own to get back within 11 with 8:41 to play. However, senior Joe Ritchay (Wisconsin Rapids, WI/Lincoln) halted the run with a tough three-point play and Ryf added a three to push the lead back to 17 in the final eight minutes.
 
The Vikings cut the deficit to single digits, 57-48, with 4:29 left but the Pointers scored the next 10 points, capped by threes by Ryf and Jordan Lutz (Amherst, WI/Amherst), giving UWSP a 67-48 lead with 1:45 remaining.

"The second half, we knew we were just one play from snapping their run," Ritchay said. "We had a couple uncharacteristic plays but we knew if we stuck together and stayed calm we could make plays down the stretch."

"It was on the back of our defense, I believe we got eight consecutive stops," Semling said of the win. "It's been like that all year. Defense has been our constant and then we know our offense will all of a sudden ignite us."

Ryf was named the Final Four's Most Outstanding Player after backing up a 21-point performance on Friday night with 17 points and five assists. He was joined on the All-Tournament Team by Pelkofer and Joe Ritchay (Wisconsin Rapids, WI/Lincoln).
 
Ritchay contributed across the board, finishing with 15 points, three rebounds, five assists, three blocks and three steals. Pelkofer tallied 14 points, six rebounds and three assists, while Alex Richard (Spring Green, WI/River Valley) was the fourth UWSP player in double figures, finishing with 12 points and six boards.
 
"We're all seniors or juniors, so we've been around the block and we know what it takes to play a full game," Ritchay commented. "We know it starts as soon as we set foot on campus in the fall. It's not fun when we're doing it but that's another reason why we're so close as a team, because we lean on each other doing all the hard work. We know down the stretch that we're going to be there if we lean on each other and we just have to push our teammates over the top, push ourselves over the top."

UW-Stevens Point shot 55.3 percent (26-for-47) from the field in the game, including a blistering 12-for-18 (66.7 percent) from behind the arc. The Pointers held an Augustana team averaging nearly 79 points a game to just 54 points, its second-lowest total this season.
 
Augustana was led by Brandon Motzel, who provided 14 points and seven rebounds off the bench, and Hunter Hill, who scored 13. The Vikings held scoring advantages of 34-24 in the paint and 17-3 off turnovers but were outscored 36-9 from behind the arc.
 
The national championship closes out the careers of Lutz, Richard, Ritchay and Ryf, who posted a 97-21 record in their four years at UWSP. The quartet went 56-8 in Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) play, won three WIAC regular season titles and one tournament championships and made the NCAA Tournament all four years.

"Us four seniors have been role players for the last four years, so it was our turn to step up into a different role and that's what we did this year," Ryf said of the championship. "They won the national championship in 2010 and us four seniors got here in 2011, so that's the reason why we went here."
 
Lutz finishes his career with 460 points in 84 games and shot 43.5 percent from behind the arc. Richard played in 118 games, scoring 806 points and grabbing 312 rebounds, while shooting 62.3 percent from the floor.
 
Ritchay was five points shy of joining the 1,000-point club, tallying 995 points, 392 rebounds, 227 assists and 140 steals in 118 games. Ryf played in 116 games, scoring 809 points, grabbing 353 rebounds and dishing out 284 assists.

"People thought we were just going to be an average team this year," Pelkofer added. "We lost a couple All-Americans and an all-conferece big man but we returned six of our top nine and I don't think people realized that. We had good players and guys that could step up, and we used those doubters as motivation and it obviously worked." 
Print Friendly Version