Box Score

WESTERVILLE, Ohio – A furious rally from the Otterbein men's basketball team came up just short Wednesday evening during its Ohio Athletic Conference (OAC) opener, falling 87-84 to Ohio Northern University in yet another close home game.
 
The Cardinals (1-5) will finish out the week at home with another game in the Rike Center Saturday afternoon, hosting Baldwin Wallace University at 3 p.m. The Yellow Jackets, 4-2 this season, began league play with a notable 110-109 double overtime loss at Mount Union.
 
Otterbein and Ohio Northern (4-2) countered back and forth early, seeing seven lead changes throughout a very close first half. ONU held a five-point lead on two separate occasions before getting a layup in the closing minute to take a 40-34 cushion into halftime.
 
The Polar Bears outscored Otterbein 26-10 in the paint throughout the first 20 minutes and posted an 18-0 advantage in points off turnovers. The Cards committed 10 giveaways while Northern had none.
 
ONU pushed its lead to double digits, 46-36, in the opening minutes of the second half and later opened a 15-point margin by the midway point.
 
Otterbein, playing without starters Matt Hughes and Michael Howard, continued to battle and slowly chip away down the stretch, using consecutive layups from Bryan Mackenzie and Grant Fenner to ultimately get back within single digits, at 77-70, with 1:18 remaining.
 
The Cards continued their rally out of a Polar Bear timeout, closing to within 77-73 on a corner three-pointer from guard Jake Phillis and then making it a one-possession game, 79-76, on another trifecta from Phillis with 52 seconds remaining. ONU had led by 14 with 3:31 showing on the game clock.
 
Ohio Northern's Devon Allen single-handedly held off the Cardinals, making 10-straight free-throws in the final minute to help his team prevail. Otterbein had a chance to tie the game despite Allen's success at the line, but a three-pointer from Marc McCuen just missed with nine seconds to play as ONU would survive.
 
Phillis, the OAC's leading scorer at over 20 ppg., dropped a game-high 25 points to lead the Cards in scoring once again. He was just 6 of 17 from the field before burying three timely shots from behind the arc. Grant Fenner (17), McCuen (16) and Mackenzie (11) all made it into double figures as well for an Otterbein team that shot 45 percent from the field.
 
Allen finished with 21 points to lead Ohio Northern, which corralled 13 offensive rebounds throughout and, at one point, had attempted 15 more shots than the Cardinals. ONU finished at 41 percent from the floor as a group and got 19 points, on 9-of-14 shooting, from Aron Thress.
 
The Polar Bears posted a 32-9 edge in bench scoring and tallied 40 points in the paint.