By ALEX REYES
Student Writer
The Northwestern men’s basketball team came away with a 92-79 win against the University of Science and Arts on Thursday.
It was an exciting and whistle-happy, preseason warm-up for the Rangers over the weekend in Percefull Fieldhouse.
The Rangers pre-season game against the Drovers started off slow for both sides. USAO jumped out to an early lead against the Rangers and stayed out front until toward the end of the first half.
Carelessness with the ball plagued both teams, Northwestern finished with 14 turnovers, while USAO had 19. The Rangers forced several of the Drover turnovers on steals. The Drovers managed six steals on the Rangers.
USAO had eight blocks on the Rangers, but this did not deter them from getting in the paint and grabbing rebounds. The Rangers managed to outrebound the Drovers 41-36.
Offensively the Rangers wanted it more as they grabbed nine less rebounds than the Drovers in their own paint opposed to the Drovers only grabbing 14.
Both teams shot over 30 free throws but the Rangers rebounding allowed second chance points to give them momentum and eight more field goals than the Drovers.
The leading scorer for the Rangers was redshirt-junior, Adrian Motley, who dropped 28 points in the game. The Drovers leading scorer had 30 points, 13 of those being free throws. Late three-point shooting by redshirt-senior T’aries Taylor also helped.
Taylor struggled early with an air ball, but made up for it with his patented swarming defense and finished with 19 points.
Redshirt-freshman Zachary Dumas had four fouls on the night but managed to put up 15 points to make up for his mistakes.
The Drovers second leading scorer was Richard McCalop who wowed the crowd in pregame warm-ups with various dunks. McCalop played subpar on paper however only collecting five field goals and two free throws for 15 points.
McCalop was perfect on three point shooting in the second half after he sat out for most of the first half.
The Rangers managed to take the lead late in the second half though, and once they took the lead, they never looked back until the final whistle.
When the exhibition game came to a close, the Rangers hard play in the second half helped them to the 92-79 win over the Drovers.
The Rangers next game is against the University of Central Oklahoma in Durant at 5:30 p.m. tomorrow. They will also play Northeastern State University same time and same place on Saturday. Both games are a part of the MIAA/GAC Challenge.