It was an epic Friday around the NAIA! There were great games up and down the slate on both the men’s and women’s side. We saw plenty of Top 25 action
Men’s Games of the Day
NAIA Hoops Report Game of the Week
No. 1 Arizona Christian 82 – No. 3 College of Idaho 78
What. A. Game!! When you have an early season Top 5 matchup, like this one was, sometimes the games don’t always live up to the hype. This one seemed to be headed that way early as well as Arizona Christian got up by as much as 15 points in this game. College of Idaho though, just kept kind of hanging around and hanging around, until finally, with about 5 minutes to play, the Yotes started to chip away at the lead and after a Johnny Radford layup, would find themselves down 78-79 with 51 seconds to play. The Yotes had their chances in the final minute to tie or take a lead, but every shot came up short and Bryce Davis would go on to hit two final FT’s to push the lead to 4 and end up giving Arizona Christian the 4-pt win. As we mentioned in our Game of the Week article, this could be a matchup we see again at the end of the season in Kansas City!
- No. 24 Briar Cliff – No. 7 William Penn
- In the 2nd battle of Top 25 teams, William Penn hit the road to take on Briar Cliff. BC came out firing in the 1st half, hitting 7-10 from 3pt land to take a 43-31 lead at the half. As good teams do though, WPU would get themselves back into the game midway thru the 2nd half but every run the Statesmen went on, Briar Cliff was there to answer and were able to pull out the win! BC put 5 players in double figures, led by 23pts from Nick Hoyt. WPU got 22pts, 7assts from Chanze Cruesoe.
Women’s Games of the Day
- No. 1 Thomas More 62 – No. 5 Carroll 54
- These two teams may have played the toughest schedules to-date in the NAIA. However, it is Thomas More who now sits at 2-0 on the season and who already has two Top 15 wins on the season! For this one, they traveled out to Montana for the win. Carroll jumped out to the early lead, but Thomas More was able to counter and get themselves back into it at the half. They entered the 4th with a 4pt line and were able to hold on for the big road win. TMU was led by Courtney Hurst with 20pts. Jamie Pickens led Carroll with a 15pt/11reb double-double!
- No. 22 Lewis-Clark State 95 – No. 25 Rocky Mountain 69
- As you have seen already, getting road wins in the NAIA is always tough. LCSC jumped on the Battlin’ Bears early in this one, going up 24-13 at the end of the 1st quarter. In fact, LCSC would wind up winning each of the first, three quarters on their way to the win. The Warriors put six players in double figures, but it was Payton Hymas who came off the bench to score 19pts who led the way. These two teams will face off for round two later today!
Other Games of Note
- We have elected to limit ourselves, from now on, to just two games apiece for the men’s and women’s GOTD. Which makes it hard on bigger slates. On the women’s side, there was a third Top 25 matchup yesterday and it was No. 17 Loyola who took down No. 6 Southeastern (FL), 84-68.
- RV MACU got a nice 62-59 win over a tough LSU Shreveport team.
- On the men’s side:
- No. 19 IU South Bend lost at home to Bethel (IN) by a score of 98-78.
- No. 18 Cumberland, survives Bryan 70-64.
- RV Kansas Wesleyan beat RV Bellevue, 78-54. The win gives Coach Anthony Monson’s 100th Career win!
NAIA News, Notes and Milestones
- We had quite a few more head coaches get their first wins this week. Here are a few from the past few days!
- Congratulations to Matt Zosel, Southern Oregon, who got his first win as Southern Oregon got a nice win over Menlo to start his career!
- Congratulations to Matt Sherman of Central Methodist on his first win this week as well.
- Congratulations also, to Grand View women’s head coach, Jasmine Stohr, on her first career win!
- Anthony Monson, Kansas Wesleyan, got his 100th career win when his Coyotes knocked off RV Bellevue last night!
- We had a couple scoring milestones that hit on Thursday that we wanted to recognize as well. The first one is Jalen Galloway, of Loyola, who joined the 1k scorers club!
- Mason Walters, who has been one of the top players in the NAIA the past few seasons, is now the All-Time leading scorer at Jamestown! Congrats Mason!
- Lots of great matchups once again today! Including another Top 5 showdown on the men’s side! The Schedule and Links page will be out shortly!
