Eagles Fall to Rangers Big Second Half

HUNTINGDON, Pa.- The Juniata men's basketball team lost a back-and-forth thriller against Drew University, 76-73, Friday afternoon inside Memorial Gymnasium. 

Evan Eisenhart hit Tyler Lapetina on a back door cut to open the Eagle scoring, answering a Drew corner three to make it 3-2. Chase Husted found Eisenhart cutting to the rim, and Mason Hardy tossed the ball to Kyle Ruggery, who laid it with his left to give JC their first lead, 6-5, five minutes in. 

A Ty Kocak layup was followed by the first year stealing the ball away, and Sho Watson capitalized on the other end with a smooth turnaround jumper in the paint.  

The teams traded makes over the next couple of minutes, with Lapetina inbounding the ball to a diving Husted, who laid it in off the glass while being fouled. His free throw made it 19-13 JC with under nine to go in the half. 

Juniata took a narrow 32-28 lead into the locker room at the half. 

Drew came out strong to start the second, scoring 11 points in two minutes to take a 39-35 lead. 

Layups from Gabe Guidinger and Lapetina cut the deficit back to two. 

A few minutes later, back-to-back threes from the right wing from Eisenhart gave Juniata the lead back at 48. 

Juniata found their way through the Ranger press for a while, with a Lapetina layup under the hoop off a feed from Guidinger pushing the Eagle advantage to six, 65-59. 

The Eagles tried to fend off the Rangers, but a layup with a minute and a half put the visitors up by one, 72-71. 

Another Ranger layup pushed their lead to three, and two Husted foul shots in the final 20 seconds brought the Eagles back within one. Juniata fouled, and Drew made both foul shots.

The Rangers poked the ball away from Lapetina, and Guidinger stole it back with three seconds to go in the backcourt. Following the timeout, Hardy got the ball, raced up the court, and fired an off-balance three from well beyond the three-point line that caught back iron as the Eagles lost 76-73. 

Lapetina led all scorers with 21, with four rebounds, two assists, and two steals. Husted totaled 16 points, 11 rebounds, five assists, a steal and a block. Guidinger tallied 16 points, five rebounds, three assists, and four steals, while Eisenhart added 12 points, two rebounds, an assist, and two steals. 

Juniata returns to action at home this Wednesday as the Eagles host Susquehanna. Tipoff is at 7:00.