OTTAWA – Sports – The Lakehead University men’s basketball team were defeated 82-67 on Saturday evening by the Ottawa Gee-Gees.
Halftime score was 43-40 favoring the Gee-Gees. The second half would also go to the Gee-Gees, as Lakehead got plenty of opportunities, but could not finish enough plays, converting on only 31% of their field goals (25-79), compared to Ottawa’s 45% (31-46) over 40 minutes.
Lakehead’s advantage in shot attempts was thanks to some great rebounding by Yoosrie Salhia (Toronto, ON) and Dwayne Harvey (Hamilton, ON), who combined for 9 of Lakehead’s 20 offensive rebounds. Lakehead held a 46-38 rebounding edge on the Gee-Gees over 40 minutes. While Salhia was a force on the glass grabbing 12 total rebounds, he struggled to finish around the basket, going 1-12 from the field and got the free throw line only twice, hitting both for a 4 point total.
Leading scorer for Lakehead was Ben Johnson with 16 points, followed by Joseph Jones (Washington, DC) with 11 points.
Ottawa’s Johnny Berhanemeskal led the way with a game-high 20 points while Gabriel Gonthier Dubue had 15. OUA All-Star Warren Ward had 14 points and 9 rebounds.
Lakehead coach Scott Morrison speaking post-game shared, “I was pleased with our effort tonight but we had difficulty finishing in the paint, and we committed too many turnovers leading to easy buckets for Ottawa. We have made some strides in the past week but still have a long way to go. We can do nothing but keep working and put another good week of practice together.”
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The men’s and women’s basketball teams will play their final games of the pre-Christmas schedule next week at home versus Laurentian and York.
