Hickory, N.C. – The Brevard College men’s basketball team hung with the South Atlantic Conference leading Lenoir-Rhyne Bears for 20 minutes on Wednesday night, however, the Bears used a big second half to pull away from the Tornados for the 77-45 win.

The Bears outscored the Tornados 51-24 in the second half, as the Brevard shot 19.0 percent from the floor, going 4-of-21, while L-R connected on 48.6 percent from the field.

 

In the first half of play, the Bears jumped out to an early 2-0 lead on a jumper by Josh Kindred at the 19:38 mark and did not trail in the opening half although the Tornados kept it close throughout.

 

The Tornados tied the score on two separate occasions and never trailed by more than eight points in the half, remaining close to the first place Bears by forcing L-R into seven turnovers and scoring eight points in the paint.

 

Brevard had cut the Bears’ lead to 2, 23-21, with 30 seconds to go in the half. However, Lenoir-Rhyne’s Marcus Hodge hit a three-pointer with 4.2 seconds remaining in the half to give the Bears a 26-21 lead at the halftime break.

 

In the first six minutes of the second half, the Bears pounced on the Tornados, as they found their offensive stroke, outscoring the Tornados 18-6 and pushing their lead to 20 points at 47-27.

 

The Tornados would not get any closer than 18 points for the remainder of the game, as the Bears picked up their defensive pressure forcing Brevard into 13 second half turnovers and took advantage of the Tornados cold shooting from the floor.

 

The Tornados points in the second half came by way of the free throw line, as BC hit 14 free throws in the second half, making up over half of their point total for the second 20 minutes of action.

 

Sophomore forward Jonathan Whitson was the lone Tornado in double figures with 15 points to go along with his team-high seven rebounds. Fellow classmate Shane Galloway added nine points off the bench for Coach Jones’ squad.

 

The Bears were led by guard Josh Rudder, as the preseason all conference second team selection had a game-high 19 points going 4-of-4 from the three-point line and 7-of-9 from the field. Fellow preseason all conference selection Reggie Bratton added 10 points in 20 minutes of action.

 

The loss drops BC to 3-18 on the year, while Lenoir-Rhyne improves to 16-3 overall.

 

The Tornados will return home on Saturday afternoon, as they host the Railsplitters’ of Lincoln Memorial University in Boshamer Gymnasium at 4 p.m. Lincoln Memorial came back from behind to defeat the Tornados 59-56 at Harrogate, T.N.

 

###