After winning the first two games of the season, the Slippery Rock University men’s basketball team dropped an overtime non-conference game against Lake Erie College 80-73 last Saturday.
The Storm (3-0) fought back from a 16-point deficit in the final 18 minutes of regulation play and outscored the Rock (2-1) 16-9 in overtime to take the comeback victory.
Senior guard Darious Clark led the Green and White with 20 points.
Senior guard Aubin Reeves contributed 17 points and junior guard Sa’Quan Davis added 11.
Senior forward Devin Taylor returned from an injury that kept him out of the home-opener the previous week and had a game-high 13 rebounds in the loss.
SRU scored 11 of the first 13 points and took a 12-point 37-25 lead over Lake Erie at halftime.
Coming back from the break, the Rock held a 41-25 lead in the first two minutes before the Storm began its comeback.
Lake Erie went on a 12-6 with run during the final five minutes of regular play and sent the game into overtime tied 64-64.
The Storm scored the first five points in the overtime period, but Slippery Rock answered with a 5-0 run of its own, tying the score 69-69 with two minutes to go in OT.
With 1:15 to play in the game, the Storm ended the game with a 9-2 run to close out the overtime period on top.
The Green and White finished the game shooting 38 percent (23-61) from the field, 26 percent (5-19) from behind the arc, and 88 percent (22-25) at the free throw line.
SRU had a 41-29 advantage over the Storm in rebounds, but had 19 turnovers compared to Storm’s 14.
Senior John Bayardelle says that despite the loss, the season is going well so far.
“We are disappointed about the loss to Lake Erie, however we learned a lot about our team,” Bayardelle said. “We are having a hard time holding onto the ball, but I have faith that we will improve by the end of the year.”
Looking to bounce back from the loss, Slippery Rock will travel to Bloomsburg University tomorrow and Mansfield University on Sunday.
“Everyone is focused and getting ready for both games this weekend,” Taylor said. “We are excited and eager for conference play and we really need to have two good performances.”
Reeves says that the team is focusing on this weekend and not worrying about the loss.
“We can’t really worry about last weekend anymore. It’s in the past now,” Reeves said. “Right now we’re just focusing on Bloomsburg, and after that we’ll worry about Mansfield. We can only worry about the next opponent in front of us and take it one game at a time.”
After this weekend, the Green and White will be on the road for one more game before returning home to take on Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference rival West Chester on Dec. 18.
