Box Score Despite trailing at the half, the No. 10-ranked The Master's men's basketball team defeated the La Sierra Golden Eagles 80-60 Monday night in a game played at Darling Arena in Fullerton, Calif.
La Sierra led 35-34 at the half, with TMU shooting 13 of 38 (34%) from the field and just four of 18 (22%) from 3-point range. La Sierra shot 11 of 18 (61%) in the first half, including 3 of 6 from behind the arc.
"La Sierra did a really good job of competing in the first half, and they shot the ball well and we didn't," said TMU Head Coach Kelvin Starr. "I was telling them [at halftime] we needed to be more solid defensively. So I wanted them to be more disciplined and solid, and offensively be a little more intentional and spread the ball out."
The Mustangs (8-1) came out inspired to start the second half, going on a 14-2 run in the first 5:21 to go up 48-37. But the Golden Eagles came flying back, going on a 9-0 run of their own to get within two at 48-46.
But TMU came back, led by seven points scored by
Kaleb Lowery over the next 1:31 that helped spur the Mustangs to a 10-2 spurt of their own to go back up by nine.
From there The Master's just built on their momentum, closing out the second half with a 46-25 difference to get the 20-point win.
"At the end of the day our physicality wore them down," Coach Starr said.
The Mustangs finished the game hitting 46% from the field and improved to 10 of 30 (33%) from long distance. They also won the rebound battle 39-32, with 17 of those off the offensive glass that resulted in 14 second chance points.
Lowery finished with a season-high 28 points and also pulled down 16 rebounds.
Quincy Phillips came off the bench to score 16, while both
Deondre Earley and
Deaken Stangl netted eight points each. Stangl also tied his career high with nine rebounds.
The Master's will play the second game of the Hope International tournament in Fullerton, Calif. Tuesday when they will face Nobel University at 1 p.m.
