The Lancer men's basketball team opened the 2019 calendar year with an 88-79 loss to the Laurier Golden Hawks on Saturday afternoon at the St. Denis Centre.
 
With the loss the Lancers fall to 3-9 on the year and sit in second last place in the OUA west division, while the Hawks improve to 8-4 and are tied for first place with the Western Mustangs.
 
GAME STATS
Ali Sow put on a show at the St. Denis Centre, scoring 25 points for the Golden Hawks. The Lancers were led by Owen Henderson who scored 20 points himself.
 
Laurier's defense put forth a great performance, racking up nine steals to the Lancers' three.
 
Rookie Thomas Kennedy and Laurier's Kemel Archer each got double-doubles with lines of 12pts and 10 rebounds and 20pts and 10 rebounds, respectively.
 
GAME FLOW
The Lancer offense started the game off with a made three but struggled from there as Laurier's defense swarmed the blue and gold. Not only were they settling for bad shots, but the Golden Hawks lived in the passing lanes, making ball movement difficult for the Lancer offense.
 
The Golden Hawks had five steals in the first half, leading to a host of easy points in transition. The Lancers were able to cut the lead down to under 20 before halftime, but were hardly in a good place, down 46-29 at the break.
 
Laurier's defense continued to keep the pressure up on the Lancers and make life difficult for them on the offensive end. Any adjustments the Lancers made Laurier countered and kept their double digit margin throughout the quarter.
 
In the fourth quarter however, Coach Oliver changed the game plan as the Lancers went on an impressive run, bringing the deficit down to single digits for the first time since the first quarter. Unfortunately, the Lancers couldn't quite complete the comeback, falling to the Golden Hawks, 88-79.
 
UP NEXT
Windsor heads to northern Ontario to take on Lakehead in a back to back doubleheader on Friday, Jan. 11 and Saturday, Jan, 12 at 8:00pm on OUA.tv.