Mt. Berry, Ga. - When the Berry men's basketball team finds their momentum on offense, nothing, and no one can stop them.

No. 23 Berry avenged its only Southern Athletic Association loss, clinching the SAA regular season championship with a 62-58 win over Oglethorpe University Wednesday night at The Cage Center on Senior Night.

"The bottom line was to shut them [down]," said graduate student Austin Brooks. "It's always a relief when we can finish a game like we did against such a good team, we couldn't do it without our guys. We put in the work throughout the season, and we were confident about what we were going to do."

Down 51-41, Berry clamped down on defense and started to find the range on offense. The Vikings went on a 14-0 run to take a second-half lead, holding the Stormy Petrels scoreless for almost eight minutes. Chase Ellis gave Berry its first lead since the first half, and the tides continued to turn as Michael Johnson found the bottom of the net to give the Vikings a 58-53 lead, with five minutes to play.

Berry led by just three points, 61-58, entering the two minutes of the contest. The Vikings would turn to their defense again, forcing a miss and gaining possession of the rebound. OU would get another opportunity, but Blake Campbell would rebound another tying effort to give the Vikings the ball. BC head coach Trevor Lydic would take timeout to settle the troops.

"We needed to keep our composure, we've been in this situation before, both teams were going extremely hard and trying to be competitive and trying to do what's right," Coach Lydic said. "We had great senior leadership in this game, and they kept our cool when things got a little stressed," he said.

After a wild scramble that saw Oglethorpe miss another chance to tie, Brooks drew a foul and sank the front end of a one-and-one to clinch the game and the regular season championship.

Ellis recorded a double-double with 18 points and 12 rebounds. Brooks had 13 points and nine rebounds. As a team. the Vikings totalled 53 rebounds, 35 of them defensive.

The Vikings will be back in action Sunday at 3:15 p.m. against Millsaps in the quarterfinal round of the SAA Championships.