GALESBURG, Illinois—The Knox College Prairie Fire men's basketball team fell to the Lake Forest Foresters at home, losing 79-70 in a close-fought contest. With the loss, the Prairie Fire's conference record moves to 1-5 on the season.
 
In the first half, Knox's offense hung tough against the Forester defense. Ethan Meeker had a solid half for the Prairie Fire, putting up 12 points on 5-of-10 shooting while grabbing four rebounds and proving to be a nuisance to Lake Forest's offense. The team as a whole shot 44.4% from the field, while limiting the Foresters to only shooting 37.1% as a team. Despite this, Lake Forest was very protective of the ball, only turning it over twice. This resulted in them shooting the ball much more than the Prairie Fire, so despite their poorer shooting percentage, the Foresters entered the half up by two points in a closely contested game.
 
The second half saw the trends of the first continue to a much stronger degree. Knox continued to put up strong offensive numbers, with Ethan Meeker putting up 16 more points in what was a very impressive game for him. Deryk Ruple also hit three three-pointers off the bench, and the Prairie Fire as a whole shot an excellent 55.2%, including a 5-for-10 performance as a team from beyond the arc. Unfortunately for Knox, Lake Forest also were impressive offensively, and spent a lot of their possessions hoisting up threes, shooting 6-for-13 from downtown. The Foresters used this surge to increase their lead throughout the half, and wound up winning by the final margin.
 
"Another close one for us," said head coach Ben Davis. "We continue to do many things well and are progressing nicely. This is definitely a game we could have one, now we just need to go do it."
 
Knox looks to regain their footing when they travel to Monmouth this Wednesday to play the Fighting Scots at 5:30 p.m.