REDLANDS, Calif. – The University of Redlands Men's Basketball team (18-7, 12-4) concluded their regular season with a dominant 99-77 win over Occidental College Tuesday night inside Currier Gym.
The Bulldogs held the lead to start the half following made jumpers from Neil Owens (Pasadena, CA) and Cal Hansen (Burien, WA). The Tigers would comeback and take a 5-4 lead, but Khyree Armstead (Mountlake Terrace, WA) scored at the 16:37 mark to put UR on top the rest of the way.
The Tigers hung tough with the Bulldogs, though, trailing by only three, 15-12, with 10:24 left in the half. But Redlands would turn-up their intensity and take a double-digit lead, 24-14, for the first time with 8:19 remaining.
Redlands would extend their advantage to as many as 20 late in the half before taking a 58-41 lead into the break. Owens had 17 points and the Bulldogs shot 51.4% from the field (18-of-35), 50% from three (7-of-14), and 88.2% from the line (15-of-17).
In the opening five minutes of the second half the Bulldogs had extended their lead to its largest at 26 before the Tigers made a few small runs to push the deficit to around 20.
About six minutes after leading by 26, Occidental cut the deficit to only 11, 80-69, following a 24-9 run. Redlands, though, would slowly start to come out of their offensive funk by getting stops defensively as they held the Tigers scoreless for more than three and a half minutes. During that stretch the offense would come alive thanks to triples from Sam Abere (Lake Oswego, OR) and Gunner Wooden (Canton, MI) as the Bulldogs doubled their lead to 22, 91-69.
Over the final five minutes Armstead hit a three, Cameron Brown (Bakersfield, CA) made a pair of free throws, and Khair Jackson (Canoga Park, CA) hit a jumper and a free throw to help Redlands close out the win.
Joining Owens in double figures was Brown (12), Hansen (11), Wooden (11), and Colin McCarthy (Redwood City, CA) with 10. Armstead also had a big night offensively, he only scored seven points, but had six assists along with eight rebounds in only 23 minutes.
Following Pomona-Pitzer defeating Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (CMS) tonight, the Bulldogs will travel to CMS for the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) Tournament Semifinal this Friday, February 24 with tipoff set for 7:00 p.m.