SEATTLE, Wash. (Jan. 14) – The Central Washington University men's basketball team saw its five-game winnings streak come to the end at the hands of Seattle Pacific University as the Wildcats fell to the Falcons 75 - 62 Thursday evening at Brougham Pavilion.
 
Central Washington now stands at 9-3 on the season and 4-3 in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference play.  The Falcons improve to 11-4, 4-3 in the GNAC.
 
The Wildcats outshot the Falcons 42.1-percent to 41.8-percent, but the Falcons were able to convert on 25 of 36 shots from the free throw line while the Wildcats were only able to get the charity stripe 17 times the entire game.  The Falcons also had a large rebounding effort on the night, out garnering the Wildcats 40-32 including a 15-9 edge on offensive rebounds.

"We jad a rough shooting night, especially from the three point lin," Acting CWU Head Coach Drew Harris said.  "The goal was to continue to attack the rim like we had been doing th last five games, but SPU did a good job packing the paint on us.  Without our shots falling, it was hard to get going. On top of their defense, they are a great rebounding team, one of the best in the nation, we preached to our players to box out all week, but we gave up 10 offensive rebounds in the first half, which hurt us quite a bit."
 
Offensively Devin Matthews led CWU with 17 points on 6 of 9 shooting, adding three assists and four rebounds.  Gary Jacobs and Joseph Stroud rounded out the scoring with 12 and 10 points, respectively.
 
Central Washington never led in the ball game as SPU scored its first three points from the free throw line.  The Falcons led by as many as eight points in the first half and trailed by the same margin heading into halftime.
 
In the second half the Wildcats rallied to get within four points of the Falcons off a big three pointer by Jerome Bryant, and four tallies by Naim Ladd to make the score 51-55 with just under seven minutes to play.

"We did a much better job of rebounding in the second half, but we had dug ourselves a hol and had to try and fight back," Harris added. "I am proud of th way our guys fought, but w just couldn't get a lead."
 
However, the Wildcats were unable to get any closer to the Falcons who used an 11-0 run to take a 66-51 lead with 2:43 left in regulation.  From that point forward the Falcons lived at the free throw line where they scored seven of their final nine points.

"Free throws were a big part of how this game was played," Harris explained.  "We had a lot of fouls called on us and they wnt to th line early, and that led to our guys being in foul trouble.  Anytime a team shoots that many more free throws than you, it make it hard to get in a rhythm on both sides of the ball."
 
Mitch Penner paced the Falcons scoring attach with 22 points and eight rebounds on 7 of 15 shooting including 2 of 3 from long range.  Joe Rasmussen added 16 points.
 
Central Washington turned the ball over 16 times in the contest, their highest total in their past five contests, all of which were wins.