Wed, Nov 19 2008
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Published November 25, 2007 12:31 am - It wasn’t the 96 points that the high-scoring Missouri Southern Lions put up Saturday night that had Lions coach Robert Corn in a pleasant mood. Balanced Lions romp to victory By Ryan Atkinson
sports@joplinglobe.com It wasn’t the 96 points that the high-scoring Missouri Southern Lions put up Saturday night that had Lions coach Robert Corn in a pleasant mood. It was how those points were scored. The Lions had five players in double figures and another player with eight points as they cruised to a 96-71 win over the Mid-American Christian Evangels in the final game of the Freeman Sports Medicine/Chris Tucker Memorial Classic on the Leggett & Platt Athletic Center. The win moved Southern to 5-0 while the Evangels dropped to 4-5. “The thing that I like most so far about our team is the fact that there aren’t any egos on the floor,” Corn said. “I don’t see any selfishness and everyone is pulling for each other. That’s a huge first step to becoming a pretty good basketball team. We’ve certainly got a lot of work ahead of us, but we’re making some good steps in the right direction.” Vincent Ateba, Southern’s 6-foot-4 forward who had a game-high 21 points, said the Lions were so unselfish that it sometimes comes back to haunt them. “Nobody cares who is scoring the points,” he said. “Sometimes we pass up shots we should take ... we make one too many passes and turn it over. That’s just how this team is. There is no selfishness.” Ateba notched his 21 points by knocking down eight of his 12 shots from the field and going 5-of-6 from the foul line. Tony Webb, a 6-2 senior, and Skyler Bowlin, a 6-2 true freshman, each add 17 points. Carl Junction product Kyle Schrage, 6-8 freshman, and T.J. Britton, 6-3 senior, chipped in with 11 points apiece. “That’s pretty well been routine with us so far this year,” Corn said. “We’ve been a very balanced basketball team. It’s not a situation where we count on one guy to get 20, 25 points ... we’ve had different guys step up and be the key contributor.” The Lions got off to a blazing start, thanks in large part to Bowlin. The freshman nailed a pair of free throws before the opening tip after the Evangels were nailed with a technical foul for dunking in pregame. Bowlin then led the Lions on an 18-2 run, hitting a layup, draining a pair of 3-pointers and then stealing the ball and taking it back for another layup. He scored 10 of his 17 points in that run that ended with the Lions up 20-2. “I hadn’t been shooting the ball real well,” Bowlin said. “So it felt good to be able to come out and kind of start things off for us.” Southern’s only cold spurt of the night — a 5:46 spurt during which the Lions were outscored 10-2 — allowed the Evangels to pull within four (31-27) at the 3:53 mark of the first half. The Lions, however, answered with a 14-4 to end the half with a 45-31 lead. Southern then scored the first six points of the second half to stretch the lead to 52-31. After Ateba’s layup at the 18:01 mark of the second half, the Lions’ lead never slid below 20. 
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