ST. PAUL, Minn. – The St. Olaf College men's basketball team got 39 points off its bench and held Macalester College to 33.3 percent shooting on its way to a 66-49 Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) road victory on Wednesday evening at Leonard Center.

Sophomore Connor Martin, junior Brendan Kauls, and senior Joe Thursby all scored in double figures off the bench for St. Olaf (5-1, 2-0 MIAC), which picked up its ninth win in the last 11 meetings with Macalester (3-4, 0-2 MIAC). The win was the fifth in a row for the Oles, which is the program's longest winning streak since recording six consecutive victories from Nov. 24, 2018 to Jan. 2, 2019.

Martin had 11 points and eight rebounds off the bench and St. Olaf was +19 in his 21 minutes on the court. Thursby added 10 points in 12 minutes of action in his season debut, while Kauls was 4-for-5 from the field on his way to a career-high 10 points. Senior Dominic Bledsoe was also in double figures with 10 points for the Oles, who enjoyed a 39-10 advantage in bench scoring in the win.

After both teams started slow offensively, Thursby provided a lift off the bench for the Oles, hitting his first three shots from the field, including a pair of three-pointers, to help St. Olaf to a 13-9 lead midway through the first half. The Oles held the Scots to nine points over the first 12:44 of the game before Gabriel Ramos hit three-pointers on either side of a layup by Caleb Williams to bring Macalester within a point, 18-17, with 5:30 left in the half.

From that point on, St. Olaf outscored Macalester by a 15-6 margin over the remainder of the half to take a 33-23 halftime lead. Kauls had eight of the Oles' final 12 points of the half and St. Olaf's bench accounted for 21 of its 33 points in the opening 20 minutes thanks, in part, to 10 points from Thursby and eight from Kauls. Ramos was 4-for-5 from behind the arc while scoring 13 of Macalester's 23 points in the half.

Early in the second half, the Scots hit 4-of-5 shots from the field over the span of 2:07 to trim the Oles' lead to six, 44-38, with 13:57 remaining. Junior Charlie Haff snapped a 7-2 Macalester run with a three-pointer to push St. Olaf's lead back to nine on the next possession and the six-point margin would be as close as the Scots would get the rest of the way.

After shooting 38.2 percent (13-for-34) from the field in the first half, the Oles heated up to 54.2 percent (13-for-24) after the break, while holding the Scots to a 35.5 percent (11-for-31) clip. Macalester was just 2-for-12 (16.7 percent) from three-point range in the second half after going 5-for-10 (50.0 percent) before the break.

Caleb Williams, the MIAC's leading scorer entering the night at 22.5 points per game, scored a game-high 14 points for the Scots but was just 6-for-19 from the field. Ramos did not score in the second half and finished with 13 points.

St. Olaf embarks on a run of three-straight home games on Wednesday, Dec. 8 with a 7 p.m. contest against Saint Mary's.