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Leafs end 8-game fall at Cougars' expense
 Tues., Jan. 28, 2003

      GOSHEN – No finishing touch cost the University of Saint Francis a valuable win on the road Tuesday night at Goshen College. The Maple Leafs snapped an 8-game losing streak rallying for a 67-63 win over the Cougars.

     USF (12-13, 2-5 Mid-Central Conference) led by as many as six points in the second half, but managed to hit just 2-of-5 free throws in the last six minutes. The Cougars missed two crucial front ends of 1+1 opportunities and Goshen made the most of its chances to grab the win.

   “I knew if we allowed (Goshen) to hang around that with our mentality the way it is, I didn’t like our chances,” USF Coach Jeff Rekeweg said. “If we make our free throws, we take care of business. It’s terribly frustrating and afterwards I was speechless.”

    The Cougars shot just 37 percent overall, 67 percent from the line hitting 8 of 12 free throws in the second half. Chase Holden led USF with 26 points, John Gensic added 12 and Nick Ankenbruck had 10, all in the first half. USF trailed by 10 points on two different occasions in the first half, then battled back to lead by four points twice before settling for a halftime tie at 31.

     In the second half, USF inched ahead 47-41  on a pair of Gensic free throws. Goshen battled back and took its first lead in the second half after a bad USF pass. Holden answered restoring the USF lead momentarily, 57-56, before Jeremy High drilled a 3-pointer to give Goshen a 59-57 lead.

     Jontae James, who managed just 3 points, hit the second of two free-throw opportunities with 1:15 to play for a 63-62 USF lead, but the Cougars didn’t score again. High scored inside, Zach Beiswanger missed, High hit one of two free throws with 11 seconds left for a 65-63 Goshen lead, and James double-dribbled with three seconds left. High hit both free throws and USF didn’t even get off a final, futile shot.

     “What can you say positive after we shot the way we did from 3-point range?” Rekeweg observed. Gensic was 1-for-10, Ankenbruck 1-for-7 and Zach Beiswanger 0-for-3 from 3-point range.

    “With 40 seconds to play, we’re just passing the ball around the perimeter, nobody is looking for a shot and we have to take a timeout,” Rekeweg recalled. “We set up a play, didn’t execute it, but still got a shot that we just couldn’t finish.”

    USF resumes the second half of MCC play on Saturday at Huntington at 3 p.m.

 

-- GO USF --

 

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