Cedar Rapids, IA -- Today, North Central University (NCU) men's basketball hit the road for a date with the Coe College (CC) Kohawks. NCU came into this game following a road loss to a good Wisconsin Stevens Point squad. On the other hand, Coe has won 7 straight games leading to a 9-1 season record that has them receiving votes in the D3hoops.com top 25 rankings. Tonight's game would be an absolute barn burner which featured 10 lead changes and took till the final seconds to decide a winner. Coe College would eventually walk away victorious with the 72-70 win over the Rams.
The first half would start with the Kohawks taking an early 4-0 lead. They would then extend their lead to 8-2 with 4 minutes gone. The Rams responded with a three by senior Tanner Holman to cut it to just three. Back-to-back buckets by Carrington McNeal would give the Rams their first lead of the night at 9-8. Over the next seven minutes, the lead would trade hands 4 times, with NCU holding the 22-20 advantage after a three-point strike from bigman Cameron Thomas. Over the next three minutes, the lead would continue to trade hands as Coe worked to get to the free throw line and NCU continued its success from deep. With 5 minutes to play, the Kohawks would close out the half on a 13-3 run to take its biggest lead thus far at 39-32. The Rams went 6-13 (46.15%) from three while holding Coe to just 1-8 (12.5%) from deep in the first half.
The second half would start with an action-packed display of offense coming from both sides. At 16:08, Nik Feller would drain a three to spark an 8-0 NCU run to cut the lead to just one. North Central would eventually regain the lead at 49-46 after another three-pointer, this one coming off the hand of freshman guard Jayden Livingston. The Kohawks would tie the game at 49-all before Jayden Livingston would cash in on another deep bomb to his his team back the three-point advantage. With the score sitting at 60-58 with 4:46 left to play, CC would score 5 unanswered to take a 7-point lead. Steady for the Rams, Cameron Thomas would connect on a three-pointer to cut it to 65-61 with just under two minutes remaining. a bucket from either side would keep it a 4-point game with one minute to go. In the minute minute, the Rams would have to play the fouling game and would unfortunately be unable to produce enough scores to overtake the lead. The Rams would suffer the agonizing 72-70 loss.
Top Performers:
Looking Ahead:
Up next, the men are off for two weeks before they travel to River Falls for the UWRF Holiday Classic hosted by Wisconsin River Falls. The Rams will face the #7 ranked University of Wisconsin Whitewater on Friday, December 29th at 5:00pm!
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