The men’s basketball team closed January with a loss Saturday evening. The team fell to the Alaska Anchorage Seawolves by score of 115–98, ending a two-game winning streak.
Clan guard/forward Roderick Evans-Taylor opened up the scoring with a good layup, but the Seawolves would respond quickly with two straight three-pointers — a problem that plagued SFU all night.
Alaska Anchorage could seemingly shoot from anywhere, downing 20 three-pointers in all and shooting 62.5 per cent.
“They’re a very good three point shooting team,” explained head coach James Blake. “Our game plan was to get them off the three point line — I know it didn’t look like it — but that was our job.
“We just didn’t commit to what we do defensively, and that was disappointing.”
Despite this, SFU spent much of the first half neck and neck with Seawolves — often down only two points. The continual three-pointers wore on the Clan though, and they ended the half down 62–43. The gap had started to grow in the last six minutes, when SFU was outscored 20–7.
The gap only widened from there, as Alaska Anchorage scored 10 straight points to open the second half, earning a 29-point lead.
Clan guard Daniel Deflorimonte broke the vicious cycle with a layup. SFU eventually cut the gap by nearly half — ending the game down 17 points — but the result was the same: a loss.
“We just got a little too high on our horses from our two wins,” said coach Blake. “We haven’t really been playing very well offensively. It’s been our defence, guys buckling down and committing to trapping [that won those games]. We went away from that for some reason.”
Blake also cited the high amounts of three-pointers as being demoralizing to the team: “When teams make shots on you [. . .] the heads go down, the bad attitudes rear their ugly heads, again it’s been a while since we’ve seen them but we’ll clean that up for next week.”
Despite the loss, this was SFU’s highest-scoring game since their 107–103 loss five games ago. The Clan aims to rebound on the road Thursday against the Montana State Billings Yellowjackets, who are currently tied for last in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference.
SFU
Points: 98
Field Goals: 37–75 (49.3%)
3 Pointers: 12–31 (38.7%)
Free Throws: 12–15 (80.0%)
UAA
Points: 115
Field Goals: 35–58 (60.3%)
3 Pointers: 20–32 (62.5%)
Free Throws: 25–32 (78.1%)
Player of the Game: Sango Niang
For the second night in a row, Sango Niang was The Peak’s player of the game. Topping Thursday’s match with a game-high 24 points, Niang was one of the few bright spots of an otherwise disappointing game. Although the story of the night was the Seawolves’ ability to drop three-pointers, Niang was respectable in his own right, going four for nine.
Points: 24
Assists: 5
Rebounds (Off-Def): 2–3
