Quakers unable to overcome cold-shooting first half

Team led by Deon Short's 24 points

[Box Score]

(WC Press Release) New Concord, Ohio (February 23, 2004) -- The Wilmington College Quakers fell to Muskingum College 65-60 in the first round of the OAC Tournament, ending the season for the Green and White.

The Quakers scored just 14 first-half points before coming back to score 46 points in the second stanza.

Deon Short (Cincinnati/Mt. Healthy) scored a game-high 24 points on 11-of-19 shooting from the field while David Guy (Webb City, MO/Webb City) put in 19 in the losing effort.

The Quakers scored first in the game, before the Muskies scored six straight points to take a lead that they would not relinquish for the remainder of the game. The first half deficit for the Quakers grew to as many as 14 before the visitors from Wilmington cut it to a dozen by the halftime buzzer.

The team shot an abysmal 6-of-28 (21.4 %) in the first half, while hitting just 1-of-9 three point attempts.

The Quakers came out firing in the second half, and hit their first three, three-point baskets, opening an 11-2 run, cutting the deficit to three with 16:39 to play in the game. The team would close to within two on a pair of occasions, but that would be as close as the team would come, as Muskingum came out on top 65-60.

The Quakers rebounded from their poor shooting first half to put up 46 points in the second stanza, hitting 17-of-32 shots from the field (53.1 %) and shooting 9-of-16 (56.3 %) from beyond the arc.

Josh Rohrbacher (Columbus/Beechcroft) helped out Short and Guy by chipping in eight points as Stephen Gee (West Milton/Milton Union) scored six. Gee pulled down a team-high six rebounds while Short and Guy grabbed five and four each.

Muskingum was led by Jeff Smallwood, who scored 19 points while Tom Price put up 11 in the winning effort.

With the loss the Quakers end their season with a 1-25 record while Muskingum improves to 12-14 overall.