Anderson Sinks Kalamazoo’s Hopes Late, Goes 2-0 on Road Trip

The Anderson University men's basketball team (2-0) sunk Kalamazoo College's (1-2) hopes late with a 74-71 victory on Saturday in Kalamazoo, Mich. Anderson went 2-0 on the road for the weekend after battling to a 75-65 win against Adrian College (1-1) on Friday in Adrian, Mich.

HOW IT HAPPENED

• Austin Lyons scored the first eight points of the contest with a layup and two 3-pointers.
• Trailing the Ravens 14-5, Kalamazoo went on an 8-0 run to cut Anderson's lead to 14-13 with 10 minutes, 24 seconds remaining.
• The Ravens led the Hornets 30-28 at halftime.
• Kalamazoo never led during the contest. Anderson led the first 18:33 of the first half.
• Phil Bessick knocked down a 3-pointer with 15:28 left in the contest. Anderson took a 42-34 lead, its biggest lead of the half.
• Josh Decker drained a 3-pointer with 1:27 to go for Kalamazoo to tie the game at 67-all.
• Fred Shropshire responded by knocking down a 3-pointer on the following possession to give the Ravens a 70-67 lead. The Hornets did not score on the next possession,
• Maurice Knight made a free throw to put Anderson ahead by four. Ty Horky scored a layup for the Hornets to make the score 71-69.
• Knight sank another a free throw to put Anderson ahead by three. Bobby Samples missed the game-tying three for Kalamazoo with 10 seconds remaining. Tate Cooper drained a pair of free throws to go ahead 74-69.
• Horky was fouled on a 3-point attempt with three seconds remaining. He then made his first two free-throw attempts. Horky intentionally missed the third free-throw attempt to provide an opportunity for an offensive rebound and a game-tying 3-pointer, but Jordan Gadis recorded the game-clinching rebound.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE

• Anderson converted 25-of-47 (53.2 percent) shots from the field while Kalamazoo hit 24-of-56 (42.9 percent) attempts from the floor.
• The Ravens drained 8-of-17 (47.1 percent) attempts from 3-point range while the Hornets made 9-of-25 (36 percent) shots from behind the arc.
• Maurice Knight notched 25 points and nine rebounds for the Ravens.
• Austin Lyons contributed 15 points.
• Tate Cooper turned in 10 points.

COACH OWEN HANDY'S COMMENTS

• First of all, my hat is off to Kalamazoo. They have a really good team. They are mentally tough, execute with precision and play with a ton of confidence. I'm glad we got to play them early in the year because they are just going to keep getting better.
• In the second half, we started to look more like we needed to on offense. The ball was moving, and whether we ran stuff through Maurice Knight or Francis Uzorh, we had a number of different guys finishing plays: Tate Cooper, Cade Gentry and obviously Fred Shropshire hit a really big shot.
• It goes without saying that Maurice Knight is a tremendous basketball player. He made a lot of scoring plays down the stretch, but also showed a great willingness to move the ball, trust his teammates, and take what the defense offered him.

UP NEXT

The Ravens host Illinois College (3-1) in their home opener on Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. in O.C. Lewis Gymnasium.