The Lincoln Land men's basketball got their second win in a row keeping a pesky Illinois Wesleyan JV at bay, 89-84.
The Loggers and the JV Titans went back and forth for the first half of the first period with the teams trading the lead 10 times in the first 10 minutes of play. The Loggers held a 5-point lead, then the Titans erased it and built a 4-point lead of their own. With the Titans holding a 25-24 point lead, the game started to swing away from the Loggers. Illinois Wesleyan put in three straight buckets and went on a total of an 18-6 run including a 10-2 run to put themselves ahead by a game high 12 at 25-32. Lincoln Land called a timeout and was able to chop away at that advantage and close with an 8-1 run to get back within 6 at 46-40 at the break. At the break, the Loggers were trailing the rebounding margin by 11, allowing 12 offensive rebounds while pulling in only 10 of their own defensive rebounds. Although the Loggers were shooting better from the field, the rebounding margin gave Wesleyan 9 more field goal attempts to build their lead.
After the break, Wesleyan again put together a couple back-to-back scores and were right away back up 8 points. Lincoln Land was trailing 50-44 when they put together the most decisive run of the game. Over the next 4:30 the Loggers outscored the Titans by 19 rattling off a 20-1 run. Now the Loggers found themselves up the game high of 13 points. Wesleyan was able to weather the storm and keep the lead right around the 10-point mark for the next 10:00+ of play. With under 4:00 to go the Loggers still held a 10-point advantage before Wesleyan cut it to 6, then on the next possession got to within 5, then 4, then suddenly with just over 1:00 to play Lincoln Land found themselves up only 3. Illinois Wesleyan got a defensive stop and got a turnover to take possession with just :40 remaining. On the defensive possession, Keshaun Harlan got a steal and was able to call a timeout to retain possession and then was fouled on the subsequent in bounds and knocked in both free throws to give the Loggers their final breathing room. One more defensive hold gave LLCC the 89-84 victory.
Despite surrendering a triple-double, a 20-point scorer, and still being outrebounded, LLCC forced 11 more turnovers which proved the difference in the contest. For the third straight game, and the fourth this season, Keshaun Harlan surpassed the 20-point threshold, ending with a game high 21 points. Jean-Piere Villages ended with 11 and Nate Moore ended with 13. Moore, 10 second half points, Harlan, 11 second half points, Gus McCrary, 8 second half points, and Mason Neumann, 6 second half points, were the driving force of the Loggers' second half surge.
Lincoln Land has now fought their way back to .500 by getting to 8-8 on the season. Lincoln Land has very little respite as they head right back on the road Wednesday evening to travel to Rend Lake to try to avenge an earlier season 68-62 defeat.
