Eagles fall to Maryville College, 95-91
Dec. 4, 2008
JEFFERSON CITY - Career win No. 300 will have to wait for Carson-Newman head coach Dale Clayton.
The Eagles came out on the wrong end of a 95-91 contest with Maryville College Wednesday night at Holt Fieldhouse to keep Clayton from reaching the milestone.
Carson-Newman falls to 3-4 on the year with the loss, while Maryville improves to 4-2.
"We just aren't having guys step up and make plays when we need them to," Clayton said after the contest. "We didn't shoot the ball particularly well tonight, either. We have a lot of work to do before we begin conference (against LMU Saturday)."
Maryville had four players score in double figures, led by the 24-point effort of Eryk Watson. Greg Hernandez added 20, followed by Jordan Damron with 15 and Wes Lambert with 13.
Darron Maxtion (Huntsville, Ala.) led Carson-Newman with 23 points on 9-of-13 shooting. He also finished with nine rebounds. Joey Cameron (Tuskegee, Ala.) added 21 points and six boards, while Jared Stephens (Oak Ridge, Tenn.) contributed 13 points.
Maryville shot 44.8 percent (30-67) from the field, including 9-of-25 from three-point range. Carson-Newman connected at an almost identical 44.7 percent rate (34-76) and was 8-of-25 from behind the arc. The Scots made up at the difference at the foul line where they were 26-of-33 to the Eagles 15-of-25.
Carson-Newman jumped out to a 29-20 lead halfway through the first period, but three-pointers by Dustin Brown, Watson and two by helped put Maryville in front 36-32 just three minutes later.
There were five lead changes down the stretch in the first half before the Eagles settled into a 54-50 lead at intermission.
The margin would quickly grow in the second half as Kevin Hare (Lexington, S.C.) drained a pair of threes in the first minute. A basket by Andrew Johnson (Cairo, Ga.) made it 62-50 at the 18:59 mark.
The Scots soon began to chip away at the deficit and pulled in front at 72-71 on a Greg Hernandez lay-up with 10:28 remaining.
The two teams battled back and forth over the next four minutes, with Carson-Newman taking its last lead at 79-76 on a Maxtion basket with 6:18 left. Andrew Shumate and Lambert answered with consecutive threes and Maryville led the rest of the way.
Carson-Newman will be back in action this Saturday as Lincoln Memorial visits Jefferson City for an 8 p.m. tip-off. It will mark the 2008-09 South Atlantic Conference opener for the Eagles.
