Alma, Mich. - The Alma College men's basketball team snapped a five-game losing streak on Saturday (Dec. 17) afternoon, defeating Wheaton College by a 97-87 margin at Art Smith Arena. The Scots improve to 2-5 overall with the win, while the visiting Thunder fall to 5-3.
Senior Tyler Edwards (Flint, Mich./Swartz Creek) led Alma with 19 points - scoring 14 in the second half - while five of the other seven players that saw the court reached double figures.
Senior Chase Fairchild (Rockford, Mich./Rockford) netted 15 points, scoring 12 in the first 20 minutes, and hit a team-best five three-pointers, while senior Trevor Gernaat (McBain, Mich./Northern Michigan Christian/Mid-Michigan CC), freshman Ryan Stevens (Lowell, Mich./Lowell) and freshman Preston Laketa (Concord, Mich./Hanover-Horton) each tallied 14 points. Stevens notched a game-high eight assists while Gernaat collected a team-leading eight rebounds.
Freshman Luke Lamoreaux (Sterling Heights, Mich./Stevenson) added 12 points off the bench as the Scots hit 57.9 percent of their shots from the floor, including 64 percent shooting in the second half. Alma was also 57 percent (16-of-28) from three-point range and made six of their nine shots in the final 20 minutes.
Wheaton was led by Aston Francis' 23 points, while Ricky Samuelson netted 20 points, including six three-pointers. Luke Peters posted a double-double with 15 points and a game-high 12 rebounds.
In the first half, the Scots raced out to 10-2 lead on a trio of three-pointers, but the Thunder responded with a run of its own, outscoring Alma 17-4 to take a five-point lead at 19-14. The two teams stayed within five points of each other for the rest of the half, with Fairchild and Steven Harvey adding threes in the closing minutes to give Alma a 46-42 halftime advantage.
The Scots held the lead for the first nine minutes of the second half before Wheaton put together a 7-0 run to go up by six points, taking a 71-65 lead with 8:09 to play. Alma called a timeout at that point and came out of the break firing on all cylinders, putting together a 23-4 run, including a 9-0 streak right after the timeout, to pull ahead by 13 points. The Thunder could not get any closer than 10 points the rest of the way as the Scots closed out their second victory of the season.
"What a tough, gritty way to end the game," Head Coach Sam Hargraves said. "When we called timeout it could have gone either way and I'm proud of how our team responded."
Alma will travel to Salem, Ore., to take on a pair of non-opponents on the campus of Willamette University. On Tuesday, Dec. 20, the Scots will face the host Bearcats, followed by a meeting with No. 8 Whitworth University on Wednesday, Dec. 21. Both games are slated for a 5:00 p.m. (ET) start.