Box Score Bellevue, NE – The #22 Mayville State Comets took to the road in conference action to Bellevue, NE to take on the Bellevue University Bruins on Saturday afternoon.  The team was also coming with a nice streak of home wins and also entered the NAIA rankings at #22 in the latest poll this past week. 

The two teams entered the game in a very tight battle, as the lead never rose over 6 points for the Comets throughout the first half.  Gorg Alhag was a big sparkplug for the Comets to get them going, scoring 10 of the Comets' first 14 points as they took a 14-8 lead.  The Bruins slowly fought back to tie the game at 20 each, and the game continued that way in a back and forth, punch for punch battle.  The game became tied 6 more times after that point, 8 times total in the first half. The Comets were balancing their scoring efforts up and down the bench, but had a hard time in containing the Bruins as they answered back after each bucket.  The Comets found themselves down by only 3 at the half, 41 to 38.  

To start the second half, it was still a tight battle to begin, as the Comets came back to tie it up at 43 and 45 points, before the Bruins went on a solid 14-4 run to go up by 10, 59-49. Not to be outdone, the Comets answered back with 9 straight points from 5 different players, narrowing it down to a deficit of 1 to force a Bruins timeout with 8:55 to play. The Bruins answered back after breaking the Comets' momentum, coming out strong with a 22-5 run that the Comets could not seem to stop. The Comets seemed to be unable to find the bucket over that stretch, mainly getting points off free throws.  It was a tough 84-67 loss to a hard conference foe on the road. "We didn't execute like we have in past games and it showed. We have to do things consistently right against good basketball teams", Coach Darren Tighe had to say. "We will bounce back!"

Leading all in scoring was the Bruins' B.J. Shelton with 16.  For the Comets, Gorg Alhag led with 14, followed by Daniel Lindgren with 10. Eric Staebler led the team in rebounds with 9. Rebounding was a big factor in the night, as the Comets typically dominate the boards, but lost 34 to 28 in that battle to the Bruins. The Comets shot 49% from the field and only 28% from behind the arc, not their typical night from long range. In comparison, the Bruins shot 62% from that range, making 10 out of 16 shots for 30 of their 84 points. 

Next up for the #22 Comets  (13-4, 6-2 NSAA) will be at home next weekend, with a Friday and Saturday home stand against Valley City State at 7:30pm on Friday, and Dickinson State on Saturday at 5pm.