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Men’s basketball defeats Central Missouri, Lincoln

The Gorillas continued their win streak last week when they defeated Central Missouri on Thursday, Feb. 4 (79-72) and Lincoln on Saturday, Feb. 6 (85-77). The Gorillas have won five games in a row now which is the first time that has happened since the 2004-2005 season.  

“Well, I thought we did pretty well,” Head Coach Kim Anderson said. “We came away well, we won both games. Both were tough hard-fought games, but I thought our guys responded well. In particular, the Lincoln game, we got behind in the second half by ten points and we fought our way back and were able to take it into overtime and then played extremely well in overtime. We were able to beat them.”  

Ryan Pippins, senior in health, human performance, and recreation, scored a season high 26 points against Central Missouri.  

“I think we did a good pretty good job against both teams,” Pippins said. “I feel like against Central Missouri we came out with a lot of energy… Against Lincoln, I feel like we started slow and we had to fight, and it was just a dogfight ever since (the beginning).”  

Against Central Missouri, the team shot 51 percent from the field. The game against Lincoln went into overtime. Martin Vogts made a three-pointer and helped the Gorillas take the lead (77-73). The Gorillas carried out their lead and secured the victory.  

“…Antonio Givens played really well,” Anderson said.” He had 20 points and really helped us in the inside game. Martin Vogts had 18 points and Quentin Hardrict had 12. Bobby Arthur-Williams had six rebounds… We had 12 steals in that game which is a pretty high number and that certainly helped us get some… points off turnovers. Then in Central Missouri game, Ryan Pippins scored 26 points. Had a phenomenal game, had seven rebounds, three assists and made some three-point shots for us. Cameron Huefner came off the bench and scored ten points. Martin Vogts had ten points and Quentin Hardrict had 14. So, we were fairly well balanced other than Ryan. He just had a great game.”  

Pippins was happy to see the team continuing battle through both games.  

“I think the thing that stood out to me was… (that) we fought,” Pippins said. “We showed that we can get over adversity… and stay focused and win ball games.” 

Up next for the Gorillas are two games on the road. The team will head to Northwest Missouri on Thursday, Feb. 11 and then to Missouri Western on Saturday, Feb. 13.  

“Well, both of those are gonna be tough games,” Anderson said. “They’re both on the road. We’re playing Northwest first and they’re ranked, I think, in the top three in the country. They beat us here at home… We’re gonna have to play our best game to be able to beat them. Missouri Western is a team we beat here at home. They had an 18-point lead at halftime, and we came back and won. They’ve struggled a little bit lately but they’re a very, very talented basketball team so I know that’s gonna be a tough game to. So, two really tough games this week to play and like we said both of them are on the road.” 

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