Clan men’s basketball team loses at home, and on the road

By Bryan Scott

After the game between the Simon Fraser men’s basketball team and the Northwest Nazarene Crusaders was postponed by a power outage the night before, they were back on the court the following afternoon.

The game was back and forth early on, but five minutes into the half, the Crusaders took a 10–9 lead. Over the next three minutes they pushed the lead to six, leading the Clan 19–13. The Crusaders dominated in close, picking up 24 points, to the Clan’s 12 in the paint. At halftime, the score was 36–28 in favour of NNU. Elijah Matthews had 10 points in the first half to lead the Clan.

The Crusaders didn’t take anytime to pad their lead in the second half. With just over 15 minutes to play in the game, the lead was big after a Crusaders three point shot made it 49–31. The difference was briefly up to 22 points, but then the Clan began to rally. SFU dug deep, but it was lights out for the Clan, who lost the game 85–75. Matthews finished the game with 19 points followed closely by Anto Olah who had 18.

Next, the Clan ventured down to Lacey, Washington to take on Saint Martin’s Saints. The Saints jump-started the game, grabbing a 5–0 in the first few minutes. SFU tied the game at five, but that didn’t last long. The next three minutes saw the Saints go on a 10–0 run, that led to an eventual 22-point lead with five minutes remaining in the half. The Clan made up some ground but still trailed 37–25 at half time. The points were well spread out on both teams, with only one player breaking the double-digit mark in the half.

The second half was much of the same. The Saints maintained their lead throughout the remainder of the game. The Clan could not mount a comeback and lost on the road. Olah led the Clan with 14 points and nine rebounds, Matt Raivio also had 14 points. SFU remains winless in Great Northwest Athletic Conference play. With this loss, they fall to 5–9 overall.