KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A little under 24 hours removed from upsetting the No. 2 seeded William Penn Statesmen, the No. 15 Carroll College Fighting Saints fell to the No. 7 Southwestern Assemblies of God University Lions, 73-65.
It wasn’t nearly a pretty first half of basketball for the Fighting Saints, but it got the job done as they went to the locker room with a slim 37-35 lead.
Shamrock Campbell and Jovan Sljivancanin carried the majority of the weight for Carroll in the first have as they combined for 22 of the Fighting Saint’s first-half points.
Joel Polius was a thorn in Carroll’s side for the near entirety of the first half throwing down dunk after dunk to the tune of 14 points in the first half. Though Carroll outrebounded the Lions, 18-15, the Fighting Saints also turned the ball over more and had fewer assists.
The Carroll defense remained as stout as they could be as the Lions were only able to put up six points on seven Carroll turnovers.
In the second half, both teams kept pace with one another until Carroll went ice-cold around the four-minute mark after SAGU tied the game up on a Nathan Bailey three-pointer. From there, SAGU took a seven-point lead at 69-62 before Shamrock Campbell put up a contested three-pointer that dropped for three of his 16 points on the night.
SAGU continued to dominate the final minute of the game and pulled out a win over the Fighting Saints, 73-65.
Polius continued his reign of dominance over the game with a game-high 27 points and 10 rebounds.
Jovan Sljivancanin finished the night with 16 points and nine rebounds.
With the loss, the Carroll College men finish their season at 22-9 overall.
