WESTERVILLE, Ohio – The No. 10 ranked Marietta College men's basketball team defeated Otterbein University by the score of 77-69 Saturday (Dec. 10) evening in an Ohio Athletic Conference match-up. The Pioneers improve to 6-1 overall and 2-1 in the OAC. Otterbein falls to 3-4 and 2-1. [
Box Score]
RaNeal Ewing opened the game with a three-pointer to give the Cardinals their only lead of the game. The Pioneers scored the next eight points to take the lead, 8-3, and never looked back.
Freshman wing #
Brennan McKean (Jeromesville, Ohio/Northwestern)# was 4-of-7 from three-point range and scored a team-high 20 points to lead the Pioneer attack. Sophomore guard #
Tyler Hammond (Cleveland/St. Ignatius)# scored 13 points and grabbed six rebounds.
The senior duo of #
Kevin Knab (Lakewood/Lakewood)# and #
Trevor Halter (Malvern/Malvern)# were reunited for the first time this season as Halter saw his first action of the year. Halter scored 12 points and hit a pair of treys, while Knab added 12 points of his own.
Marietta led by as many as 17 points, 34-17, in the first half when McKean drained a three-pointer with 4:22 remaining in the period. The Pioneers took a 36-21 advantage into halftime.
The second half started with a scoring spurt by both teams. Marietta outscored Otterbein 18-11 in the first six minutes of the period to extend its lead to 22 points, 54-32. After the Pioneers cleared the bench, Otterbein scored the final 12 points of the game to cut the deficit to eight at the final buzzer.
Chris Davis paced the Cardinals with 21 points and seven rebounds. Ewing added 19 points and six boards.
For the game, Marietta shot 47.7% (31-of-65) from the field, 35.7% (10-of-28) from behind the arc and just 50.0% (5-of-10) from the free throw line.
Otterbein hit 41.2% (21-of-51) of its shots, including 25.0% (5-of-20) from long range. The Cardinals converted 73.3% (22-of-30) from the charity stripe.
The Pioneers travel to Athens on Wednesday, December 14th for a 7 p.m. contest in the Convocation Center against Ohio University.
