St. Thomas now has won six of eight games all-time against Omaha. The Tommies even the 2024-25 season series with a 95-84 win over the Mavericks Saturday night at Schoenecker Arena.
More importantly, the victory knocked Omaha (16-11, 10-3 Summit League) out of first place, and propelled UST (20-7, 10-2 Summit League) into the league’s top spot.
Twenty wins is the ninth time in the Johnny Tauer era that the Tommies have won at least 20 games. It is also put UST into history as the only team to transition to Division I and record 19 wins three straight seasons, and one of three teams to post back-to-back 20-win campaigns.
Tauer told the MSR after Saturday’s win that Omaha “score a lot of points and they got 3-4 guys who can play 1-on-1,” including Marquel Sutton, who led the visitors with 20 points.
The difference in the two games Tauer pointed out – Omaha knocked off UST 89-78 at home Jan. 23, and Saturday’s win, “The tempo was how we wanted to play them,” said the coach.
Drake Dobbs led St. Thomas with 23 points, his third straight 20-point night. Kendall Blue (Woodbury) and Carter Bjerke tied with a team-high four rebounds apiece.
Tauer said during his post-game comments that praised his team’s “collective rebounding” during his post-game comments. He later told the MSR that the 6-6 Blue is a huge part of that board effort.
“The way he’s grown over the last three years,” said Tauer of the junior guard. “He was thrown in starting DI basketball as a freshman. He’s just such a nice young person.”
Blue, Bjerke and Dobbs hold their own on the boards, especially Blue, surmised Tauer.
“Kendall last year led us in rebounding, and he is leading us in rebounding this year,” he said of Blue, who has 114 total rebounds thus far this season (4.2 rpg). “He always is in the right spot. He is such a smart player,” concluded the coach.
The Tommies now embark on a two-game road trip with games at South Dakota (Feb. 19) and Oral Roberts (Feb. 22) before returning home to Schoenecker Arena to close out the regular season against North Dakota (Feb. 27) and Kansas City (March 1).