Weber State basketball boat raced in first half in St. Thomas matinee Sunday
MBB final: St. Thomas 88, Weber State 65
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- Weber State guard Jace Whiting (24) looks past a St. Thomas defender on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
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- Weber State center Malek Gomma (7) shoots against St. Thomas post Carter Bjerke on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
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- Weber State guard Trevor Hennig (6) rises to shoot against St. Thomas defenders on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
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- Weber State guard Tijan Saine Jr. (3) looks to drive against St. Thomas on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
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- Weber State guard Trevor Hennig (6) sizes up St. Thomas defender Ben Oosterbaan on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
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- Weber State forward Edwin Suarez Jr. (0) drives past St. Thomas player Ben Oosterbaan (34) on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
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- Weber State guard Trevor Hennig leaps to corral the basketball near the St. Thomas sideline on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2025, in St. Paul, Minn.
Weber State men’s basketball entered Sunday as the Big Sky’s highest-scoring team but one stat told the entire story in the Wildcats’ morning matchup at St. Thomas.
The Tommies made 14 of their first 20 field goal attempts while WSU made just four.
“We missed so many layups,” WSU head coach Eric Duft said. “I was disappointed in our energy level. We just weren’t moving fast enough. … Credit to them, they’re a good team. But we’ve got to learn from it, we’ve got to grow.”
Weber State got on the wrong side of an early 25-5 first-half run and couldn’t recover in an 88-65 loss to St. Thomas on Sunday morning in St. Paul, Minnesota.
WSU’s Trevor Hennig hit a deep 3-pointer to make the score 9-7 for the home team at the first timeout of the game. Things went sideways from there for the Wildcats as star scorer Nolan Minessale got going for St. Thomas and nearly outscored the Wildcats by himself in the first half.
The sophomore guard entered Sunday with 12 career 20-point games while averaging 20.1 points per game this season. He reached that mark before halftime, shooting 9 of 10 for 21 points to lead St. Thomas (7-4) to a 47-23 halftime lead. Minessale finished with a career-high 32 points on 12-of-16 shooting, adding five assists and four steals.
Weber State (4-5) shot 16 of 27 after halftime and shot to a 7-0 run out of the locker room. Tijan Saine Jr. scored 10 points and WSU scored 17 total in the opening 5:55 of the second half, cutting the margin to 56-40, prompting a St. Thomas timeout.
But any hope was short-lived. Carter Bjerke hit a 3 out of the timeout and Jermaine Coleman got three the old-fashioned way; the margin was quickly back to 22 and the Tommies held from there, with WSU’s 42-41 advantage in the half of little importance.
“I was proud of the fact that we hung in there. We played at times like who we are,” Duft said. “It comes down to every night, who’s the team who’s most engaged, most on edge, the team that has that competitive fire in them — that’s the team that’s going to win.”
St. Thomas ran its home win streak to 22 games, second-longest in the country behind only Duke.
Duft said Wednesday after beating Oral Roberts that he’d talked to coaching staffs at South Dakota State, North Dakota State and South Dakota in the summer about playing at St. Thomas.
“They’re like, ‘Hey, good luck,” Duft said.
Jace Whiting led Weber State with 17 points, four assists and four steals while shooting 7 of 13 overall and 3 of 5 from distance in his team’s second game without junior sharpshooter Viljami Vartiainen. Hennig added 15 points and Saine totaled 12. Malek Gomma pulled down 10 rebounds.
Weber State remains on the road to again face Kansas City, this for a 6 p.m. MST tipoff.
BIG SKY WINS CHALLENGE
Using a points system that awards 1.5 points for road wins and one point for home wins, including both men’s and women’s games, the Big Sky Conference won the Big Sky-Summit Challenge for the first time on a 25-20 tally.
On the men’s side, Montana State took a surprising home loss to Oral Roberts and Omaha won in an upset at Portland State. But Northern Colorado beat South Dakota on an overtime tip-in, and Montana (surviving at North Dakota) and Idaho (at South Dakota State) tallied road wins.
WBB: NDSU 79, WSU 72
Weber State women’s basketball lost its fifth straight game but things looked a bit more encouraging Saturday than they did Wednesday.
After North Dakota State blasted Montana State, the Big Sky’s best, by 25 points Wednesday, the Wildcats battled the Bison to the end in a 79-72 loss Saturday afternoon at the Dee Events Center.
That effort against NDSU (7-2) came after Weber State (2-7) lost by 31 at South Dakota State on Wednesday.
Saturday’s game was tied 40-40 at halftime and WSU won the fourth quarter 19-15. It was the 24-13 third quarter that led NDSU to victory.
Senior forward Antoniette Emma-Nnopu led Weber State’s first good 3-point display of the season, going 3 of 4 from distance to total a game-high 27 points with 11 rebounds. Sydney White scored 13 points.
Junior wing/forward Paris Lauro, who started earlier in the season and has fought through poor shooting, added an encouraging 11 points while going 3 of 3 from downtown. Hannah Robbins pitched in eight points and seven assists.
Avery Koenen led NDSU with 21 points and 10 rebounds.
Weber State next plays two non-Division I opponents at home, beginning with Montana Western at 11 a.m. Tuesday.
