Eastern Michigan Athletics
Eastern Michigan University
10-10 (2-5MAC)
Miami
8-13 (5-3MAC)
EMU's Frantic Second Half Rally Comes Up Short at Miami
1/30/2010 4:46:33 PM | Men's Basketball
The Eagles stormed back from a 31-14 halftime deficit to cut the RedHawks lead to one, 46-45, with 8:27 left to play
Box score.
YPSILANTI, Mich. (EMUEagles.com) - A furious second-half rally fell just short for the Eastern Michigan University men's basketball team here Saturday, Jan. 30, in a Mid-American Conference cross-divisional battle with the Miami University RedHawks in Millett Hall.
The Eagles stormed back from a 31-14 halftime deficit to cut the RedHawks lead to one, 46-45, with 8:27 left to play, but Miami held off the challenge to record a 61-51 victory.
Senior center Justin Dobbins (Cleveland, Ohio-Glenville) led the Eagles, now 10-10 overall and 2-5 in MAC play, with 15 points and nine rebounds while Brandon Bowdry (St. Louis, Mo.-Taylor (Mich.) Truman) added 10 points and nine rebounds and senior guard Carlos Medlock (Detroit, Mich.-Murray Wright) added 10 points.
Miami, now 8-13 overall and 5-3 MAC play, was led by Antonio Ballard and Nick Winbush with 11 points each.
Eastern finished the game shooting 40 percent from the field on 20-of-50 shooting while the RedHawks shot 50 percent on 18-of-36 from the field.
The Eagles opened the game on a three-point field goal by Medlock and the game stayed close for the first 10 minutes before the host RedHawks turned up the offense, moving out to a 29-12 lead at the 2:18 mark.
With Miami holding a 31-14 lead, the Eagles had a chance to get a little closer when Medlock hit a long-range jumper at the buzzer, but the play was reviewed by the officials and was ruled to be after time had expired.
The Eagles made just 5-of-22 shots in the first half for 22.7 percent while Miami was shooting a healthy 47.4 percent (9-of-19) from the field. Miami also hit 5-of-9 (55.6 percent) from beyond the arc to Eastern's 1-5 (20 percent) in the first half.
Eastern opened the second half with an offensive flurry, out-scoring Miami 22-15, over the first eight minutes to cut the RedHawks' lead to 10, 46-36, at the 12-minute mark.
The Eagles kept their momentum going from that point, out-scoring Miami, 9-0, to cut it to a one-point deficit, 46-45, at the 8:27 mark of the second half.
Miami would answer the challenge, however, for a 10-1 run of its own to up the lead back to 10, 56-46, with 5:14 left.
Antonio Green (Inkster, Mich.-Dearborn Heights Robichaud) would quiet the crowd with a long triple to trim the Miami lead to seven, 56-49, with 4:43 left in the game.
Eastern would get it back to a five-point deficit, 56-51, on a Medlock layup with 3:02 left, but once again the RedHawks would withstand the EMU surge to post the 10-point win.
EMU will stay in the state of Ohio for a Monday, Feb. 1, cross-divisional matchup at Akron.
