MISHAWAKA, Ind. — The No. 7 Bethel Pilots (17-4, 10-1) were in a neck-and-neck battle with the Foresters in an exciting first half before running into struggles in the latter part of the game against a scrappy Huntington Foresters (16-5,6-5) team in the Gates Gymnasium Wednesday night.
Preston Phillips had a good shooting night with 19 points on 6-8 from the floor, 3-3 from beyond the arc, and seven rebounds.
Luke McBride went 7-11 overall and 2-6 from downtown for 17 points, and Trent Edwards dropped 16 points on 6-10 shooting and 4-4 from the charity stripe.
Austin Cripe had 11 points on 4-8 from the floor and 1-5 from deep and four rebounds, and Ike Umeh rounded out the Pilot offense with 10 points on 3-4 from the field and 4-4 from the line.
The Pilots won the battle off the glass with 32 total rebounds to the Foresters’ 25. HU took advantage of 12 points off Bethel’s six turnovers, but BU scored 11 second-chance points on eight offensive boards.
The game began as a dog fight, trading buckets with Preston Philips answering a Forester jumper with a three-point play to take a 4-point, 14-10 lead at 15:20.
After more back-and-forth, Cripe gave Bethel another 4-point advantage at 7:34 in the first half with a layup in the paint, 30-26.
Huntington went into halftime with a triple with one second to go in the half to lead 48-42, but things continued to go their way as the second half began.
The Foresters went on a 7-2 run with Anderson scoring the first bucket of the half at 19:28 with a layup but were followed with a triple, dunk, and alley-oop layin to grow the Huntington lead to 55-44.
McBride laid one off the glass at 15:17, followed by a triple at 14:44 to get the Pilots within 4 points, 60-56, then Preston Phillips drained a three at 12:56 to make it a one-possession 64-61 HU advantage.
A technical foul and personal foul put the Foresters at the line at 10:33, where they made four consecutive free-throws and got back to an eight-point, 73-65 lead.
Huntington got back to double-digits at 7:02 from a pair at the line, 83-70, but Cripe dropped a pair at the line at 6:14, Phillips hit a layup at 4:37, McBride had a jumper at 3:29, and Phillips split a pair at the charity stripe at 2:45 to get within six points in the waning minutes.
However, HU fought back and took home the win 92-82 to upset the Pilots in an NAIA top-25 matchup, as BU just rose to seventh in the NAIA Coaches Poll earlier that day.
The Pilots look to bounce back against the Indiana Wesleyan Wildcats on Saturday, Feb. 1 at 3 p.m. at the Troyer Fieldhouse in a tough couple of games that is followed by the University of Saint Francis (Ind.), who are both receiving votes in the NAIA Coaches Poll.