KENOSHA, Wis. - The Carthage College Red Men started the season out with a strong performance on Friday night at Tarble Arena, defeating Rockford University to open the 2017 Carthage College Classic, 86-66.

"Tonight was a good, solid first game," said head coach Bosko Djurickovic after the win.  "You can always find things that you are unhappy with an certainly we had a few of those tonight and will need to play better.  Tomorrow is going to be a very difficult challenge, Lake Forest is a very good basketball team, who was picked second in their league… Given where we are at and what we are moving forward with I thought we played nicely tonight and hopefully will be better tomorrow."

The Carthage defense in the first half shut down the Regents through the opening ten minutes, holding Rockford to 4-13 shooting as the Red Men built a 22-9 lead.  The Red Men offense was led by Brad Kruse, as the all-conference first teamer went 5-6 in the first half for a team-high 13 points.  

On the play of Kruse, Djurickovic noted, "Kruse was outstanding tonight.  It was maybe as good of an all-around game as he has had in four years and he has had a lot of really good games.  He is moving so much better this year.  He hitting his three.  I can't say enough about Brad Kruse and the fine game he had."

Kruse finished the game as the leading scorer for the Red Men, going 8-13 from the field, 3-5 from deep and 1-2 from the line for 20 points.  On top of that, Kruse added seven rebounds, six assists, four blocks and four steals in the win.

Right behind Kruse in the first half was freshman Jordan Vedder, making his Carthage debut, whom after missing his first two three's, went 4-4 from behind the arc to score 12 of his 14 and finish as one of five Red Men in double figures.  His 12 points were the only points the Red Men had in the half off the bench as they built a 45-33 halftime lead.

"Jordan Vedder gives you the threat of the three-point ball and that makes things easier for Kruse and the other guys.  Jordan Thomas was very, very good tonight.  Brad Perry wasn't the best Brad Perry we have had but he still turned in a very solid effort."

The Red Men sealed the game in the second half, never letting the Regents within 12 and eventually built a 25-point lead before closing out with the 20-point win.
For the game the Red Men shot 50% and 41.2% from three, connecting on 14-of-34 attempts from deep.  

Jordan Thomas, Brad Perry and Steve Leazer rounded out the double digit scoring for the Red Men with 19, 12 and 10 respectively, while Kamal Shasi added six assists in his debut.  Lastly, TJ Best scored five points in the first 16 minutes of his career on Friday.

The Red Men will return to action on Saturday at 4:00 p.m. in the Carthage College Classic championship game when they face Lake Forest College.