PALOS HEIGHTS, Ill. – The Roosevelt men's basketball team rallied from a late six-point deficit against host Trinity Christian to have the ball with chances to tie or take the lead on two occasions in the final seconds, but the Lakers came up just short in a 61-59 loss to the Trolls on Saturday afternoon.
Joshua Dillingham led the Lakers (4-9, 2-5 CCAC) with 15 points, while Adam Alexander added nine points and eight rebounds.
Jordan Perry led the Trolls (4-9, 2-5 CCAC) with a game-high 21 points.
The Lakers led by five at the break and went up seven in the second half before the Trolls responded and took a six-point lead with 3:27 left.
Trinity Christian led by that same amount with 1:43 remaining when Kyle Bumbalough made a pair of free throws and Jake Asquini canned a trey to sandwich a Troll's free throw and get the Lakers within two.
Roosevelt got the ball back and called timeout with 25 ticks left, and the ball got into the hands of leading scorer Jake Ludwig. The second-year standout drove baseline and was fouled with 8.3 seconds left to go to the line, where he made the first but missed the second as Perry grabbed the rebound and was fouled to go to the other end and split a pair.
Trailing by two with 6.1 seconds left, the Lakers came out of a timeout and found Carson Hughes at the top of the arc for what would have been the game-winning three, but the ball bounced off the rim and allowed the Trolls to survive.
"Give Trinity lots of credit," Roosevelt head coach Joe Griffin said. "They were playing without two starters and they were able to drag us. They played a lot better today than they did Wednesday. We were cold from three [5-for-26] and we didn't do a good enough job of getting it inside to get to the free throw line. We were poor offensively, but we did like a lot of looks we got. On defense we continue to struggle guarding one-on-one on the post and in the perimeter, which continues to stress our defense.
"We'll have to start mixing it up more," Griffin said. "We have two games before Christmas to get back on track."
Roosevelt heads to Gary to take on Indiana Northwest this Wednesday.
