Rend Lake - 73
Lincoln Land - 50
Lincoln Land's men's basketball team dropped a road contest to Rend Lake, 73-50.Â
The Loggers traveled to Ina, Illinois for their first game in NJCAA Region 24 play of the young season. It turned into a long Saturday afternoon for the Loggers pretty soon after the tip. The Loggers looked ready to compete getting the first two buckets and going up 5-0 to start the contest. Unfortunately, that would be the only and last lead of the game for the Loggers. Rend Lake went on a 10-0 to grab the lead and never relinquished it. The Warriors of Rend Lake looked to put the game away early as they then built the advantage out to 10 near halfway through the initial frame. Once trailing 17-8 Lincoln Land put together their best stretch of the game clawing back to within 1 at 21-20 with 4:00 to go in the first half. Rend Lake again rattled off a 10-0, this time to close the half and LLCC walked into the locker room at half down double digits for the first time in the afternoon at 31-20. 11 was the closest it would ever get again. Rend Lake got the first two buckets of the second half to push the advantage out and never looked back. At one point Lincoln Land got as close as 12, but yet another Warrior run, 8-0 this time, put the game back out of reach for the Loggers. Rend Lake's advantage held around 20 for much of the final 11:00 of the contest and got to a game high 23 in the final minute before the final buzzer.Â
The Loggers have had a different high scoring each game this season, tonight it was freshmen Stephan Braun who put in 12 including 3-4 from three. Fellow freshmen AJ Tillman Jr is the only other Lincoln Land player to get to double digits with 10. Between the Loggers and Warriors, stats did not overwhelming point to Rend Lake except in shooting percentage (51%-30%) which proved too much for LLCC to overcome. One of the biggest positives on the night for Lincoln Land was their sharing of the ball, assisting on 15 of 19 makes. Sophomores Mick Downs and Logan Tomlinson as well as Tillman each dished out a team high 4 on the afternoon.Â
The Loggers fall to 0-3 on the season and 0-1 in Region 24 play. The next chance to see the Loggers come in St. Louis on Wednesday night before they come home to Springfield for the first time this season on the 18th.Â