Dec. 6, 2014 - The Concordia-Chicago men's basketball team looked to notch their first win on Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference play and third overall as they travelled to Madison, WI to take on Edgewood College. The Cougars put up a tough battle, but the Eagles had the inside game working in the first half and the outside game in the second half as they held off CUC by a final score of 89-76.
The two teams played close to the vest in the early going, and the Cougars took a 9-6 lead when Mike Walmer (Orlando, FL/Orlando Christian) hit a three from the left wing. Walmer and Kylan Anderson (Chicago, IL/home schooled) provided much of the offense over the first 12 minutes, and the game remained neck-and-neck with six ties and three lead changes occurring. Anderson's jumper provided the last tie of the half at 19-19, but Derek Braucht's jumper gave the Eagles the lead and triggered a strong finish to the half by the hosts. The Cougars would get just two field goals over the final eight minutes of the half, and the Eagles closed out the half on a 14-5 run on Dylan Rusch's buzzer-beating jumper for a 33-24 halftime lead. Edgewood shot 52 percent overall for the half but connected on 14 of 19 shots inside the arc.Â
In the early minutes of the second half, Anderson's two trimmed the lead to seven, but the Eagles soon heated up from the outside. After Edgewood shot just 1-10 from behind the arc in the first half, they hit their first five tries from long range. Tal Diekvoss accounted for four of the five triples with his fourth one giving Edgewood a 59-42 lead with 11:34 remaining.
The Cougars did not concede however, as Kostas Doxakis (Thessaloniki, Greece) provided a spark off the bench. The seinor scored eight straight points on a pair of free throws and a pair of threes. His triple at the 7:52 mark brought the Cougars to within single digits at 63-55.
Anderson scored on the next possession to make it a six-point game, but that would be as close as CUC got. Diekvoss soon added his final three of the night to make it a 70-57 lead. The game then slowed to a crawl as the hosts scored 17 of their final 19 points at the free throw line, and the Cougars ran out of time.Â
Edgewood finished the second half shooting 67 percent from the field on 14-21 (8-12 threes) and 22-29 from the line and finished the game with 58 percent from the field and 7 percent from the stripe.  The Eagles were led by Dylan Rusch with 24 points (4-9 FG, 2-4 3FG, 14-16 FT), Also in double figures were Diekvoss with 18, Trevor Neale with 12 and Joe Klocek with 10.
Concordia-Chicago was led by Anderson with 23 points (9-17 FG, 2-3 3FG, 3-5 FT). Walmer added 13 points and Doxakis 10, all in the second half. Brandon Stinson (Schiller Park, IL/East Leyden) recorded nine points and a team-high seven rebounds. The Cougars shot 45 percent for the game on 29-64 (6-15 threes) and 71 percent from the line on 12-17. The Cougars return to action after finals week next Saturday with a game at Marian University in Fond du Lac, WI.
