Complete Results
Monmouth College made better than half of its shots and earned its first Midwest Conference victory against the Prairie Fire Saturday at Memorial Gymnasium.
The Fighting Scots (3-8, 1-5 MWC), one game removed from shooting under 30 percent in a lopsided loss at Lawrence University, shot a blistering 53 percent overall and defeated the Fire 88-77. Monmouth connected on 19-of-36 shots in the first half for 53 percent and kept that pace up in the second half, connecting on 15-of-28 from the field. The Scots added seven three-point baskets.
Monmouth's Corey Gruber sank a jumper at the 17:06 mark to give his team an 11-9 advantage, a lead the Scots would never relinquish. Gruber had a big night offensively, hitting four three-point baskets and scoring a game-high 26 points.
The Prairie Fire (1-10, 0-6 MWC) made a run at the Fighting Scots to trim an eight point deficit to 21-19 with 11:55 to play in the first half. Monmouth answered back with a three-pointer by Gruber, an offensive put-back by Bryce Donaldson and a three-point bucket by Kendall Cox for a 10 point lead at 29-19. The Fire managed to get within seven before the Scots built the lead back up to 43-32 at halftime.
Monmouth grabbed its biggest lead of the game at 60-40 with 11:01 to play. Knox on four occasions trimmed the deficit to nine points, but couldn't get any closer. The Prairie Fire shot 38 percent overall, including 3-of-16 from three-point range in the second half. A normally strong free-throw shooting team, the Prairie Fire made just 12-of-21 (57 percent) from the foul line.
Sophomore Ian Horvath (Addison, Illinois) scored a season-high 19 points to lead the Fire. Junior guards Ben Wetherbee (Sydney, Australia) and Tanner Carlson (Annawan, Illinois) added 13 points each. Junior Joe Kozak (Park Ridge, Illinois) contributed 11.
Monmouth's David Altman scored 12 points. Cox and Michael De Decker added 11 apiece off the bench. The Fighting Scots received 38 bench points to just 14 for the Prairie Fire.
The Fire travels to Lake Forest College Tuesday for a 7:30 p.m. match-up against the Foresters (4-6, 2-3 MWC). Knox will try to snap a 10-game losing streak and earn its first conference win of the season.
Lake Forest lost Saturday 70-67 at Illinois College. The Foresters, 1-1 so far this season at home, have lost five of their last six contests.
