Columbia, Mo. – Tonight the sixth ranked Columbia College men's basketball team matched up against third ranked William Penn (Iowa) University in the Hampton Inn Thanksgiving Classic. This is the first time these two teams have played each other since the Statesmen ended the Cougars season last year in the second round of the national tournament by a final score of 86-68. Despite their best efforts, tonight's game ended similar to their last matchup with William Penn defeating Columbia by a final score of 87-79. This was the first loss for the Cougars this season as they drop to 6-1 on the year.
In the first half of the game, both teams came out looking to push the tempo against the other. The Cougars missed their first three shots of the game but quickly got on track making their next three including two three pointers to jump out to an early 8-2 lead. The Statesmen caught fire following the 8-0 run by Columbia College and went on a 20-8 run of their own to take a 22-16 lead with just over 12 minutes remaining in the first half.
The Cougars went cold from the field as the half progressed and looked out of sync as the Statesmen lead grew to 17. However,
Malik Ray was able to swing the momentum in Columbia Colleges direction in the final minutes of the half when he hustled all the way back on defense and swatted a William Penn layup away. They scored the next four points of the game and cut the lead to 13 heading into the halftime break. The Cougars were led by
Jesse Brown who had eight points in the half.
The second half started very similar to the first with Columbia College going on an 8-2 run. They were finally able to cut the lead to single digits thanks to
Jesse Brown who provided a big spark for the team on offense and defense taking two charges and scoring two points.
With just under 12 minutes remaining in the game,
Jackson Dubinski was able to knock down a contested three point shot to tie the game at 57. The Statesmen followed that with a 7-0 run but the Cougars stayed resilient and fought back once again taking the lead after five straight points from
Nic Reynolds. However, the Statesmen were able to close out the game on a 17-7 run to give Columbia College their first loss of the season.
The Cougars had four players in double figures including
Nic Reynolds who had a team high 23 points points in the game. Additionally,
Jackson Dubinski added 16 points,
Jesse Brown had 12 points and
Preston Whitfield dropped in 11 points to round out the top scorers for Columbia College.
In the first game of the classic, the Missouri Baptist University Spartans defeated Avila (Mo.) University by a final score of 87-61. The Spartans were led by Luke Call who had 23 points and David Gabrovsek who added 17 points.
The Hampton Inn Thanksgiving Classic continues tomorrow afternoon with a double header starting at 1 p.m. William Penn University will take on Missouri Baptist University at 1 p.m. followed by Columbia College matching up against Avila University at 3 p.m.
