Green Bay survived a Milwaukee rally to snap a four-game skid against its arch rival, taking down the Panthers for the first time in the Doug Gottlieb era with a 79-76 victory on Monday night.
The Phoenix came out of the gates red hot, winning the opening tip and ultimately making their first nine field goals to open up an early lead. C.J. O’Hara and Justin Allen got to the rim early and often, racking up the paint points in the opening minutes of the contest. Rob Stroud hit a long three on the 9th straight make, helping the Phoenix build their lead up to 22-9 before Green Bay missed a shot from the field. Caden Wilkins pieced together five straight points for Green Bay, as well as buckets from Preston Ruedinger and LeBron Thomas to approach a 20 point advantage, and finally surpassing that mark with a Thomas and-1.
The Phoenix lead got as high as 21, before Milwaukee was able to rally and close the gap to 46 to 32 after a Danilo Jovanovich long ball in the closing seconds of the first half. This would surpass Green Bay’s biggest halftime lead of the season, besting the previous high of 13 that the Phoenix held against Haskell Nation in December.
The Panthers momentum surge continued out of the halftime break, as Milwaukee scored the first seven points of the half to cut the deficit in half. The Phoenix got buckets from Allen and O’Hara to build the lead back into double digits, but Milwaukee countered with another barrage of made shots to close Green Bay’s advantage to a single possession. An Amar Augillard layup and an Esyah Pippa-White free throw would tie the game briefly, as O’Hara split a trip to the charity stripe on Green Bay’s next possession to put the Phoenix back in front by one.
Milwaukee’s Augillard gave the Panthers their first lead of the game on the next trip down the floor, making a pair of free throws with 10:04 left in regulation. Isaiah Dorceus and Chandler Jackson each hit a three, assisted by each other, to put the Panthers up by five, ultimately the biggest lead Milwaukee would hold.
Allen and O’Hara made layups to close the Milwaukee lead to one point, before Pippa-White hit another long ball to extend the advantage. Gottlieb called a timeout to finally bring a long awaited media timeout, which the Phoenix used to spark a 6-0 run, grabbing the lead back from Milwaukee. Jackson connected on a layup to tie things up, before Ruedinger hit a triple to put Green Bay in front for good. Marcus Hall, Allen and O’Hara were able to hit clutch free throws down the stretch of the game to close things out. Dorceus launched a long three to try to extend the game at the buzzer, but had to shoot over Ramel Bethea and ultimately was off line to end the contest.
Allen led all scorers with 21 points in the game, with O’Hara adding 19 and Thomas scoring 12 from the Phoenix bench to round out double-digit scoring efforts for Green Bay. Milwaukee ended the game with five players in double digits, led by Jovanovich’s 19 points, 14 from Dorceus and 10 apiece from Jackson, Augillard as well as Pippa-White.
Allen joined Gottlieb in the postgame press conference, where among other topics, the two talked about the game, Allen’s adjustment from Division III and some disgruntlement with how the Horizon League scheduled this rivalry. You can see the full press conference below.
Green Bay will be back in action on Friday, when the team hosts IU Indy at the Kress Center. Tip off is scheduled for 6 p.m. CT.
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