SHAWNEE – Burke Putnam's first-game performance with Oklahoma Baptist was nothing short of outstanding as the guard led the Bison to a 74-61 win against Wayne State during the first night of the GAC/NSIC Challenge.
He scored 33 points on 14-of-21 shooting (66.7%) to help the green and gold win its season opener. Three others scored 10 for OBU:
Brantly Thompson,
Nigel Wilcox and
Harrison Stoddart. For Wilcox, he also pulled down a game-high 10 rebounds.
First-half action was close. The Bison got off to a good start, scoring on five of their first six possessions. The last of those brought a Thompson layup to push the score to 10-4.
Wayne State then picked up its defense and fought back to tie things up. After attaining that six-point advantage, OBU scored just once on its next six possessions and the Wildcats tied the scoreboard at 12 after a jumper by Ben Dentlinger at 11:38. Over the remainder of the half, there were six lead changes and three ties.
A layup by Jordan Janssen pushed Wayne State up 25-24, before Putnam scored two straight baskets to move the home squad back up, 28-25. By the break, OBU led 31-29.
In the second half, the Bison offense turned in an impressive performance. After hitting just one long ball in the first 20 minutes, OBU hit seven after halftime.
About six minutes into the half, the Wildcats were down 43-39. At that point, OBU seized command. An 11-2 run, which saw three-pointers from
Jaquan Simms and Putnam, pushed the home team's advantage to 54-41 with about 11 minutes left.
The visiting Wildcats managed to pull the deficit to single digits just once after that.
The three-point line was the biggest difference in the second stanza. OBU hit 7-of-16 (43.7%) while Wayne State was three-for-15 for 20 percent.
Tomorrow, the Bison will play Minnesota State Moorhead at 7:30 p.m. at Noble Complex.
