NEWBERRY – A comeback in the second half by the Newberry College Wolves was not enough to beat the Queens University of Charlotte Royals and with the loss, Newberry falls to 3-2 (0-1 SAC).
The Wolves fell to the Royals 95-88. Queens moves to 4-0 and 1-0 in the SAC.
Newberry shot 39.2 percent in the field and 24.3 percent from behind the arc.
The Wolves had 14 second chance points, 32 points in the paint and 45 points from the bench. Newberry forced 27 turnovers and only gave up 14 points to the Royals bench players.
Brandon Taylor was the Wolves leading scorer with 18 as he went 7-14 in the field and 4-10 from three point land. Xavier Holmes dropped 13 points, eight boards and two dimes.
Gerald Evans finished with eight points, five assists and five steals while James Stepp and Hamish Burns combined for 20 points.
The Wolves opened up the game with back to back threes from Brandon Taylor and James Stepp. The Royals came right back with a two free throws to tie the game at six.
The first 10 minutes went back and forth as the Wolves regained the lead when Mitch Riggs made two free throws to take a 13-12 lead. The Royals went on an 8-0 run to take a 20-14 lead and then went on another run to push their lead to 25-18 with 9:47 remaining in the first half.
The Wolves closed the gap to four when James Stepp made two baskets at the charity strike. Todd Withers came right back down the floor and hit a three of his own to push the Royals lead back up to seven with 7:42 remaining.
With five minutes left in the first half, Rob Lewis hit a three to go up by 14. Brandon Taylor rushed down the floor to hit a jumper in the paint to cut the lead to 12. The Wolves tried to battle back but was down by 10 at the half.
The Wolves came out firing in the second half as Brandon Taylor hit a jumper to start a hot streak. Newberry closed the gap again and pulled within eight when Xavier Holmes made a layup and got fouled. Holmes hit the free throw to make the score 50-42.
The Royals stretched their lead back to 13 when Rob Lewis hit a three to make the score 63-50. With about 10 minutes remaining in the game the Royals held a 72-56 lead. The Wolves stepped up their defensive pressure which caused a lot of turnovers for the Royals.
Mitch Riggs hit a layup at the five minute mark to make the score 83-72. Newberry kept battling as Gerald Evans made two free throws to pull within 10.
Back to back threes by the Wolves cut the gap to six with the score at 85-79 and 4:08 to play. Xavier Holmes then hit back to back layups to pull within three and make the score 89-86 with 2:46 minutes remaining.
All of the momentum was on the Wolves side till the Royals hit back to back layups to make the score 93-86 with under a minute to go. Evans hit one last layup with 13 seconds left and the Wolves fell to the Royals 95-88.
Newberry will face off against Warren Wilson on Saturday at 2 p.m. in a non-conference match-up.