SPRINGFIELD, Mass. ? Carl Arts scored 19 points and McCade Olsen had 12 of his 14 points in a furious second-half comeback Thursday, but it was not enough to rescue the Alaska Anchorage men's basketball team from a huge halftime deficit as the Seawolves fell 56-50 to Augusta State in the NCAA Division II national semifinals at the MassMutual Center.
Nationally 4th-ranked UAA (29-6) also got nine points from senior guard Chris Bryant and eight points from senior forward Cameron Burney as it completed the second-longest playoff run in school history. Senior All-American point guard Luke Cooper had seven assists to push his season total to 310, the fourth-highest number in 52 years of D-II history.
Augusta State (27-6), ranked No. 10, advances to Saturday's national championship game against the winner of Thursday's late semifinal between No. 1 Bentley and No. 3 Winona State. The Jaguars, of the Peach Belt Conference, were led by 18 points and nine rebounds from All-America forward A.J. Bowman, while 6-11 center Garret Siler dropped in 17 points on 8-of-11 shooting.
The Seawolves were hurt by poor first-half shooting as they fell behind 28-11 at the intermission, making just 19.2 percent (5 of 26) of their shots in the opening 20 minutes. The point total marked an all-time low for any Seawolf team ? one less than the 12 scored at Division I power Kentucky in 1980.
UAA came out of the locker room firing, however, scoring 11 points in the first 3:30 of the second half and cutting the ASU lead to 38-35 on a Bryant three-pointer at the 10:52 mark. The Seawolves stayed within seven points of the Georgia school for the rest of the way, but could get no closer than three points.
Trailing 53-48 with under a minute left, Arts had a wide-open three-pointer rattle in and out, and the Jaguars grabbed the rebound, essentially ending UAA's last shot at the comeback.
The Seawolves finished the year with school records for most wins and fewest losses. UAA's 35 games played was also one of at least 20 school records set by the Great Northwest Athletic Conference champions.
