OKLAHOMA CITY – The No. 2 Mid-America Christian men's basketball team faced a strong challenge from Southwestern Christian, but a late bucket by Terrance Jones put the Evangels in-front and a pair of Tony Dorsey free throws with 16 seconds left sealed a 96-91 win inside the Gaulke Activity Center on Thursday night.
Senior guard Ashford Golden led six Evangels into double-figures with 21 points on 6-of-13 from the floor and 8-for-11 from the free throw line, finishing just a board shy of a double-double with nine rebounds.
Mid-America Christian (18-0, 9-0 Sooner Athletic Conference) jumped out fast out of the gate once again as a pair of scores by Golden and Marvin Lowe along with a Dorsey three quickly put the Evangels in-front 7-0 just three minutes in.
After a pair of Southwestern Christian (10-7, 3-6 SAC) three-pointers closed the gap to three, the Evangels rapidly extended the edge to double-digits with layups by Lowe and Dominick Ford, along with a D'von Moore triple to make it a 16-6 edge with 13:46 left.
MACU built its advantage to 17 later in the half when Moore buried a deep triple from the right wing and Damarius Brooks nailed a fade away jumper from the right baseline on the following possession, setting the score to 37-20 with 5:41 left.
The Eagles whittled the Evangels edge to 12 with 3:17 to go, but MACU quickly bounced back to build its largest lead of the contest when Lowe and Golden combined for all eight points during an 8-2 streak, making it a 49-31 game with just 1:23 remaining.
Southwestern Christian closed out the final 73 seconds by scoring six of the final eight to bring the score to 51-37 at the break.
Offensively, the Evangels shot a blazing 21-for-30 (70 percent) from the field in the opening half, including 5-for-9 (55.6 percent) from the three-point arc.
Early in the second half, MACU built its advantage back up to 18 at 64-46 following a pair of Ford free throws and a Golden and-one with 16:02 to go.
However, the Eagles refused to go down without a fight as SCU rattled off nine unanswered over the next 2:30 to cut the MACU edge to single digits.
MACU managed to build its lead back to 12 as Carlos Slaughter muscled in an and-one with 9:30 on the clock, setting the score to 80-68 before the Eagles defense stifled the Evangels over the next two minutes. SCU tallied nine straight to shrink the deficit to three.
Slaughter ended the streak with a pair of free throws, but the Eagles continued to claw away at the MACU advantage until a pair of Derek Dantzler-Fulner free throws tied the score at 83, the first tie since the start of the contest
Southwestern Christian took its first lead on a Richard Anderson three-point play following a Dorsey lay-in, making it 86-85 with just 2:58 to go.
The two teams went back-and-forth over the next minute as an Ashford Golden and-one briefly put MACU back in-front, but SCU's Beau Archer hit a step-back three with 2:25 remaining to quickly give the Eagles the 89-88 edge.
On the ensuing possession, Jones missed a tightly contested layup, but was able to rebound his own miss and put the Evangels ahead for good with a tip-in with 2:04 left.
The MACU defense clamped down over the next two minutes as neither team could muster another score until Slaughter made a strong drive to basket down the right side and laid it in with 35 seconds on the clock, stretching the MACU edge to 92-89.
On the next SCU possession, Golden was able to take advantage of a critical Eagles miscue on the other end, getting the steal and drawing a foul, burying a pair of free throws to extend the lead to five with 24 seconds remaining.
Following a Dantzler-Fulner putback off a missed three to bring it back to a three-point edge, Dorsey drew a foul on the in-bound pass with 16 seconds left and he was able to ice the game from the foul line with two conversions to seal the 96-91 victory.
Despite a strong second half offensive performance by the Eagles that featured 18-for-35 (51.4 percent) shooting and 9-of-18 (50 percent) from three, Mid-America Christian still finished the game outshooting SCU by knocking down 57.9 percent from the field, 50 percent from the three-point arc and 76.7 percent from the charity stripe for the game.
In his first start with the Evangels, Lowe finished with 13 points on 5-of-5 from the floor and 3-for-5 from the free throw line. Ford and Terrance Jones chipped in 12 points apiece while Dorsey ended his night with 11 points and a team-high three assists. Moore rounded out MACU's double-digit scorers with 10 points on 4-of-9 shooting, 2-of-3 coming from the three-point arc.
With a win, MACU is now just one win away from tying the 19-game win streak set by the 2004 NCCAA Division II National Championship squad.
Mid-America Christian will officially wrap up the first half of Sooner Athletic Conference play on Saturday as the Evangels will head to Abe Lemons Arena for a 3:45 p.m. tip-off against crosstown rival, Oklahoma City.
