After having sat out their previous game, Harding forward Trey Williams was looking forward to getting back out on the court against MUS last Tuesday night.
With fresh legs and an offensive aggressiveness, Williams did not disappoint as he dropped 33 points on the Owls to lead the Lions to a 60-52 conference victory.
MUS looked good early against Harding as they handled the Lion pressure and got easy baskets. Consequently, the Owls shot 62.5% from the field in that first half, a great percentage. However, MUS shot only 16 shots, 10 fewer than Harding. Thus, even though the Lions shot worse than 50% in the first half, they still took a 33-27 lead into the break because they had shot more.
Though they were down, the Owls were feeling confident that they could weather Harding's pressure and stay close to give themselves a shot at the end. They had few turnovers and were beating the Lions down the court, so the opportunities would be present in the second half.
However, Williams would not let his team lose. Every time MUS made a run, Williams stepped up and hit a big shot to keep the Owls out of reach.
Ryan Baum tried to keep MUS close as he tallied 23 points and 3 rebounds. John Phillips also added 8 points and 4 rebounds.
Yet the Owls never had an answer for Williams, who shot 13-23 from the floor, including 4-9 from the three-point range.
MUS did out-rebound Harding 23-20 and shot 51.4% from the field for the game, but they could never regain the lead in the second half.
With the loss the Owls drop to 11-7, 1-1. They stay on the road Friday night as they travel to ECS to battle the talented Eagles. Tipoff is set for 7:30 p.m.