Jefferson Hagen
MacEwan Athletics

KAMLOOPS, B.C. – The MacEwan Griffins' shooting deserted them at the wrong times in a contest they very much had a chance to win on Friday night.

Playing in the cavernous Tournament Capital Centre – ("It's not like a normal gym," said MacEwan head coach Mike Connolly. "It's wide open. There's 50 feet behind each hoop.") – the Griffins missed 22 three-point attempts and 41 total field goals in a 69-63 loss to the Thompson Rivers University WolfPack.

"I don't think we took bad shots, we just missed," said Connolly. "And we missed easy layups. It was at key times when we missed shots. In the third quarter we were missing, and they came down on those seven possessions in a row through the second half and just scored. There were 14 easy points we gave them out of the 69."

With the result, the Griffins fall to 0-9 on the season, while the WolfPack improve to 2-5.

Matthew Osunde led MacEwan with 19 points and nine rebounds, while Milan Jaksic had 12 points and Job Janda chipped in six points and 10 rebounds.

Denys Bachurin netted a double double in leading TRU with 24 points and 10 rebounds, while Asher Mayan chipped in 16 points.

Connolly was quite happy with his team's defensive performance, though.

"Our defence was pretty good today," he said. "This team runs that Princeton offence, which is tricky, but for the most part we dealt with it.

"We were up 38-37 at the half and we just couldn't score in the third quarter," he added. "But the guys kept their heads up, kept working and pushing, they did some good things. It was right there and winnable for us if we just made some shots."

The teams will meet again on Saturday (8:30 p.m. MT, Canada West TV).

"I'm not that unhappy," said Connolly. "It's hard and the guys are down. But they also know we played well defensively, we hustled and we worked. We just missed shots."