NATCHITOCHES, La. – After a tightly-played first half, Northwestern State used a big offensive push in the second half to pull away from HCU with the Huskies suffering an 82-63 defeat at Prather Coliseum in Southland Conference men's basketball play on Thursday night.
The game opened with a
Bonke Maring layup on the opening possession with a 7-0 Northwestern State (13-8, 5-3 SLC) run to follow.
Brycen Long knocked down five free throws on the next two possessions for the Huskies (7-14, 4-4 SLC) to make it a 9-7 ballgame at the 15:34 mark. Dayne Prim scored for the Demons on their next possession but a Long three-pointer paired with a
Zach Iyeyemi free throw evened the score at 11-11 with just over 14 minutes left in the half.
Ja'Monta Black and Demarcus Sharp combined to score the next nine points for NSU for a nine-point Demons lead. HCU got it back to six but NSU again pushed its lead to nine, 26-17. Maring then went on a personal 9-0 run in the span of less than three minutes to tie the game at 26-26 with 5:18 to go in the half. Emareyon McDonald answered with back-to-back threes for the Demons and the teams traded scores down the stretch with NSU leading 36-30 at the break.
Maring again made a layup to open scoring in the second half, pulling the Huskies within four but NSU scored the next 11 to lead 47-32. HCU kept the game in the 13-16 range for the next few minutes until Black drained consecutive triples and gave the Demons a 60-39 advantage. From that point, the closest HCU got was 19.
Maring led HCU with 21 points, connecting on 8-of-13 from floor and 5-of-8 from the charity stripe. He was one of three Huskies to pull down five rebounds. Freshman
Pierce Bazil ended the night one point shy of his career-high with 16, shooting 4-of-9 from the field and 7-of-10 from the line. Long had 10 points for the Huskies and
Deshon Proctor led the team with six rebounds while adding five points.
The Huskies shot 36 percent (18-of-50) from the floor and just 16.7 percent (2-of-12) from behind the arc but made 25-of-37 (67.6 percent) from the foul line. Northwestern State, meanwhile, shot 44.6 percent (33-of-74) overall and 39.4 percent (13-of-33) from three.
The Demons out-rebounded the Huskies by eight, 44-36, and got a game-high 31 points from Ja'Monta Black who knocked down 9-of-21 from long-range. He was the lone NSU player to score in double-figures.
HCU heads west to Commerce, Texas for a rematch with a Texas A&M-Commerce team the Huskies defeated 68-59 in Sharp Gym on Jan. 12 with a 4:30 p.m. tip-off on Saturday, Jan. 28.
