MINNEAPOLIS-- North Central earned a hard fought victory over Martin Luther College on Saturday. The Rams honored senior athletes and parents before the action which saw North Central break the game open midway through the second half to pull away for a 94-75 win over Knights.

Martin Luther College (New Ulm, Minn.) came into Saturday's game at the bottom of the UMAC standings but showed good energy and effort and led the Rams by five after the first three minutes. North Central was able to bounce back and retake the lead but the Knights refused to go away. With MLC leading 14-13 five minutes into the game the Rams got a lay-up from senior Josh High (Buffalo, Minn./Buffalo) to retake the lead and never fell behind again the rest of the night. The Rams would lead by as many as 12 in the first half before a Knights three pointer made it 45-36 at the break.

In the second half the Rams tried to create separation early on but MLC continued to stay within reach, getting the difference down to 48-40 with 17:45 to go in the game. However, North Central had an answer and went on a decisive run that created a 25 point difference with 13:50 to go and the game was never in question again.

KEY SEQUENCE OF THE GAME

The Rams struggled to pull away for the first 25 minutes of the game before they blew the game open over a seven minute stretch to put things out of reach and secure an important conference win.  Martin Luther hit a shot to make it an eight point game with slightly less than 18 minutes to play. That is went the Rams took over.

North Central ripped off a 19-2 run that included holding the Knights scoreless for over four minutes. Four different Rams scored during that stretch which represented the balanced scoring NCU got all night.

KEY PERFORMANCES OF THE GAME

For the second straight night five Rams reached double figures and the team shot over .500 from the floor. That balance was highlighted by a 17 point, 6, rebound, 5 assist, 3 steal performance from junior Travis Voigt (Green Bay, Wis./N.E.W. Lutheran) and a 17 point, 4 assist night from senior Josh High as the Rams all-time career leader from distance went 5-8 from behind the three point line.

Junior Isaiah Rustad (Hudson, Iowa/Hudson) scored 14 points with 8 boards and 4 assists and sophomore Joel Cline (Green Bay, Wis./Southwest) added 13 points and 6 rebounds. Senior Cody Martin (Burnsville, Minn./Burnsville) scored 12 points with 5 assists.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE

• Martin Luther fired .443 (31-70), normally a solid night, but could not keep pace with the Rams who fired .570 (34-59) from the floor
• North Central dished out 22 assists on the night with each player who reached double figures also handing out three or more assists
• The Rams won the rebound battle 35-33 but were outscored 14-8 in second chance points

UP NEXT

North Central goes on the road next weekend to wrap up the 2015-16 regular season with a key pair of conference road games. The Rams could finish any where between second and fifth in the conference standings and could host a home conference playoff game the final week of February pending the results of their trip up north.

Friday the Rams take on current second place team the College of St. Scholastica (Duluth, Minn.) at 5:30 p.m. Saturday NCU is at Wisconsin-Superior for a 3 p.m. tipoff with the Yellowjackets currently sitting in the fifth spot which is also the final conference playoff slot.