GRANVILLE — The Otterbein men's basketball team was led by 11 points from sophomore Chase Garito in a 58-44 loss at Denison on Tuesday night.

The Basics

• Records: Otterbein (2-2 overall), Denison (4-0 overall)
• Venue: Livingston Gymnasium - Granville, Ohio

Otterbein Stat Leaders

• Garito added a team-high seven rebounds to his 11 points.
• Junior Brock Waits finished with seven points, three rebounds and two assists.
• Senior Jared Kreager posted six points, four rebounds and three steals.
• Graduate students Cam Evans and Brennan Rains tallied five points each. Evans added three rebounds and two steals to his stat line.
• Redshirt junior Jarius Jones finished with four points, six rebounds, three assists and two steals.

Game Highlights

• First Half: Evans scored Otterbein's first points of the game with a 3-pointer, and a layup from Garito put the Cardinals up 7-4 with 15:22 left. Denison responded to take an 11-7 edge with a run capped by a 3-pointer with 11:21 remaining. Back-to-back 2-point baskets from Kreager and Garito tied the score at 13 with 9:10 left, and a pair of free throws from junior Julian Heckman put the Cardinals up by two with 7:43 remaining. A 3-pointer and pair of free throws put Denison up 22-17 with 4:11 left, and the Big Red extended their lead to 27-19 with 1:35 remaining. Garito cut into that lead with a straightaway 3-pointer with 27 seconds left, but Denison capped the first-half scoring with a buzzer-beating layup to go into halftime leading 29-22. Garito led the Cardinals in scoring at the break with seven points. Evans added five points but also picked up three fouls.
• Second Half: Junior Troy Scowden opened the second-half scoring with a layup to cut the Otterbein deficit to five, but Denison answered with a 6-0 run to go up by 11, 35-24, with 17:46 left. Jones ended that run with a dunk, and a 3-pointer followed by a 2-point jumper from Waits brought the Cardinals within six, 37-31, with 14:27 remaining. The Big Red answered with back-to-back triples and a layup for a 45-31 edge before Otterbein cut the lead to 10, 45-35, with 7:59 remaining via back-to-back baskets from Rains and Garito. A Rains 3-pointer got the Cardinals back within single digits, 47-38, and a pull-up jumper from Waits once again made it a nine-point game, 49-40, with 4:53 left. But that was as close as the Cardinals would come, as Denison pushed its lead out to 15, 55-40, with 2:33 left en route to the victory.
• Key Team Stats: Otterbein shot 35.8% from the field and was 4-of-22 (18.2%) from 3-point range. Denison shot 46.8% from the field and was 5-of-16 (31.3%) from 3-point range. The Cardinals were 2-of-6 (33.3%) from the foul line, while the Big Red were 9-of-12 (75%). Denison out-rebounded Otterbein by a narrow 33-32 margin.

Notables

• Denison is now 6-4 against Otterbein dating back to 2009.
• Denison received four points and is listed in the "Others receiving votes" section of this week's D3hoops.com Top 25 poll, which was released on Sunday.
• Head coach Andy Winters is in his sixth year at Otterbein and has an all-time record of 60-56 at the helm of the Cardinals.
• Evans ranks 18th all-time at Otterbein in career scoring with 1,282 points.
• Saturday's game marked the third of four straight against North Coast Athletic Conference opponents for Otterbein. The Cardinals fell 88-77 to Wooster on Nov. 17 and won 63-59 at Ohio Wesleyan on Nov. 23. They host Kenyon on Sunday at 2 p.m.