Southeastern Rally Short in Rivalry Loss

DURANT, Okla. – Southeastern put all five starters in double-figures, led by Tyler Lonzie's 19 points, but it was not enough to pick up the victory over rival East Central on Monday night in Bloomer Sullivan Arena.
 
The loss drops the Savage Storm to 6-9 overall on the year and 2-7 in Great American Conference play heading into a Wednesday night matchup with Southwestern Oklahoma State at 7:30 p.m. in Weatherford, Okla.
 
SE shot 47.6 percent from the field and made 12 threes, but could not offset an ECU shooting performance that went 56.9 percent from the floor and 11-of-22 on threes.
 
Lonzie's 19 points came on an impressive 9-of-9 shooting effort which matches the third-best shooting percentage performance in league history.
 
Nathan Jackson was next in line with 13 points, followed by 12 from Anton Cook and 10 each from Jett Jobe and Kevin Buckingham.
 
Jobe nearly completed a double-double with assists, finishing with eight, while Cook dished out seven in the contest.
 
Jackson hauled in a team-high seven rebounds while Buckingham added six, but the Storm found itself on the wrong end of a 37-to-25 rebounding margin.
 
Six of the Tigers first eight makes in the contest were threes, but the Storm was valiant, falling behind by as many as 12 in the first half, but putting together a late push to close it to seven points on a Cook free throw before settling on a 44-34 halftime score.
 
SE scored the first six points out of halftime and closed the gap quickly to 44-40 just over two minutes in, but ECU would recover and stretch the lead back to 10 points at 59-49 with 12:03 to play.
 
After Jobe converted on an and-one play SE began to whittle away at the deficit, making it a single possession contest at the 10:40 mark on a Lonzie jumper.
 
It was a Kyle Roberts three with 6:02 remaining which closed the gap again to a 66-65 margin, but that was as close as the game would get as the Storm was unable to close out the rally in an 86-77 loss to the Tigers.