Under the Radar Game of the Day: North Dakota at Florida Gulf Coast, 7:00 PM Eastern, espn3
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104-101 in 3OT. That was the final score of last night’s Florida Gulf Coast victory over Youngstown State, in what proved to be one of the most exciting games of the day (no slight intended towards what happened in Cedar Falls, Iowa). The game was highlighted by huge clutch shots at the end of regulation and each of the first two OT periods, before FGCU was finally able to hold off the Penguins and claim the victory. The bad news for the Eagles is that it was the first of three games in three days that they will be hosting in the round robin format FGCU Tournament. Tonight they get North Dakota and tomorrow night Bowling Green. But, for now at least, “Dunk City” is 2-1 on the season and will be looking for another strong effort the next two nights from Marc-Eddy Norelia, who scored 34 points in an amazing 52 minutes of game play last night.
Tonight’s opponent for FGCU made headlines of their own this week. The University of North Dakota has spent the past three years without a nickname following the retirement for their old Fighting Sioux name. The State legislature had stepped in to try to prevent the NCAA from forcing the school to change their name, and the end result was that the school had to retire it anyhow but was legally barred from adopting a new one for some time. Even after the time period expired, UND began a rather long and slow process of choosing a new nickname. The final two candidates were Roughriders and Fighting Hawks. This past week the winner was announced, and North Dakota is officially the Fighting Hawks. Yesterday, the Fighting Hawks beat Bowling Green 77-59 to improve to 2-1 on the year (though 1-0 as the Fighting Hawks). Tonight, the team led by Quinton Hooker (25 points and 9 rebounds yesterday) will look to pick up a second straight victory against what should be a tired Florida Gulf Coast team. If they do, only Youngstown State on Monday afternoon will stand between them and the FGCU Tournament championship.