GEORGETOWN, Texas – The Southwestern University men's basketball team had a fantastic opportunity to pull off one of the biggest upsets in the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference this season, leading Trinity University 24-22 at the half, but a strong second half from the Tigers spelled defeat for the Pirates 63-50 on Saturday evening.
Southwestern (5-12, 1-7 SCAC) is in eighth place in the SCAC standings with half of the conference slate to go and will need to string together a few wins if the Pirates are to once again earn a spot in the postseason tournament where anything can happen.
Neither team could find any footing offensively in the first half as the defensive effort shined through.
Trinity (13-4, 6-2 SCAC) took a 12-5 lead with 12:00 left in the first half on a pair of AJ Clark free throws, but the Tigers would go scoreless over the next 5:20 as Southwestern chiseled its way into a 7-0 to tie the game at 12-12 thanks to a pair of makes from Luke Hatcher and a three-pointer from Nick Crump.
Clark would end the Trinity drought with another pair of free throws before Hatcher made another shot to even the score at 14-14 with 6:25 left in the first half.
The score remained at 14-14 until Jacob Hester gave Southwestern its first lead of the game when he drained a three-pointer with 4:42 before intermission to give the Pirates their first lead at 17-14.
Less than a minute later, Hester knocked down another long-range shot to put Southwestern ahead 20-14 with 3:53 left in the opening period.
Three made free throws by the Tigers over the next couple of possessions cut the Southwestern lead down to 20-17 before Crump pushed the lead back out to five with a jumper with 1:46 before the halftime buzzer.
Another couple of free throw makes for Trinity bought the score to 22-19 before Trinity's Jacob Harvey drained a three with 0:32 to go in the half t even the score out 22-22. The make was Trinity's first point other than a free throw since the 15:52 mark meaning the Tigers went 15:20 of game time without a made field goal.
Josh Jones buried a pair of free throws for Southwestern to give the Pirates a 24-22 halftime advantage.
Brock Luechtefeld opened the scoring for either team, giving Southwestern a 26-22 lead less than a minute into the second period.
Trinity answered with two more free throws before Preston Hannah drilled a three off an assist from Hatcher for a 29-24 Pirates lead with 17:56 left in the game.
The Tigers then woke from their slumber and raced out to a 37-29 lead on a 13-0 run as Southwestern went cold over the 6-plus minutes before Sam Lacy made a layup with 11:46 left in the game ending a 6:10 drought.
Trinity jumped back out to an 11-point lead at 42-31 before blitzing back on a 9-0 run thanks to made threes from Quinten Hupp, Hannah, and Chris Smith, Jr., to only trail 42-40 with 9:20 to go.
That 2-point deficit would be as close as Southwestern would get the rest of the way as the offense fizzled out despite spectacular defense keeping the Pirates in the game.
There were no double-digit scorers, but Hannah led the way with nine points, while Hatcher turned in a seven-point, eight-rebound performance.
Harvey's 24 points for Trinity led all scorers.
UP NEXT
With just eight games left in the regular season, the Pirates will have just one more weekend homestand, and that will be next weekend when they host Austin College on Friday at 7:30 p.m. CST and then the University of Dallas at 6 p.m. CST on Saturday.
