KINGSTON, Ont – A 24-point effort from Tanner Graham helped lead the Queen's Gaels to a 99-90 overtime victory over the Western Mustangs on Friday night at the ARC Gymnasium.
The loss snaps the Mustangs five-game winning streak, updating their record to 8-8, keeping them in second place in the OUA West Division. Queen's moves to 10-5 on the season and marks their third victory in a row. They sit in second place in the OUA East, four points behind Ryerson.
It was a high-scoring team effort for the Mustangs, with four players recording double digits in Friday's contest.
Peter Scholtes led with 21 points, with
Anthony Spiridis following with 19, while
Greg Morrow added 18 points.
Alex Coote contributed 16 points, hitting four three-point shots and going 4-4 at the free throw line.
Tom Filgiano and Spiridis led the purple and white defence with seven rebounds apiece, while Morrow and Scholtes followed with six and five rebounds respectively.
Tanner Graham led the Gaels scoring efforts, notching a game-high 24 points. Mike Shoveller added 16 points and teammates Sukhpreet Singh and Sammy Ayisi recorded 14 and 13 points, respectively. Shoveller led the Gaels with seven rebounds, all of which were on the defensive end. Graham followed with six rebounds and three different Gaels also contributed four rebounds apiece.
Queen's established an early lead, starting the game off with a 12-2 run, before Western began to close the gap late in the frame. Although the Mustangs scored five of the final seven points in the quarter, the Gaels held a 16-10 lead after one.
After Shoveller led the way with 10 points in the first 10 minutes, the Mustangs shut down the 6-11 junior in the second quarter, keeping him off the scoreboard. Capitalizing on misses from the Gaels, the Mustangs offence picked up and tied the game at 25-25 with a little over three minutes left in the quarter. Western wouldn't stop there however, as a pair of three-pointers from Coote and Morrow combined with two points from Spiridis to give the Mustangs a 33-31 lead heading into halftime.
Both teams exchanged points for much of the third quarter, with the Gaels eventually holding a slight lead thanks in large part to Ayisi and Graham, who combined for 16 of their team's 25 points in the frame. Scholtes powered the Mustangs offence in the third, accounting for 11 of Western's 17 points. After 30 minutes Queen's held a 56-50 advantage.
The fourth quarter was another back and forth affair that saw the game tied at 68-68 with just over two minutes remaining. Both Morrow and Coote added four points each in the final two minutes, putting the Mustangs up by three with only seconds remaining. Unfortunately for the purple and white the Gaels found themselves at the free throw line as time expired, and Sukhpreet hit all three of his shots to send the game to overtime.
Continuing the theme of the game, the two sides went nearly basket for basket until midway through the quarter when Queen's began to pull away. The Gaels cemented their lead with an 8-0 run that ended with a little over a minute remaining, eventually claiming a 99-90 win.
The Mustangs stay on the road as they take on the York Lions on Saturday night at the Tait McKenzie Centre. Tip-off is at 8:00 p.m. and can be watched live on OUA.tv.
