By Tim Gardner
After playing major college (Division One) traditional power North Carolina State University to only a four-point loss (79-75) in an exhibition game on October 30, the Lees-McRae College Bobcats officially opened their 2024-2025 basketball season in the South Atlantic Conference/Conference Carolinas Challenge last Saturday night with an 87-82 win against the University of Virginia at Wise (UVA-Wise).
Besides Lees-McRae and UVA-Wise, the two-day tournament (November 9 and 10) featured their fellow Division II schools, King University and Carson-Newman University.
Lees-McRae and King are members of the Conference Carolinas and UVA-Wise and Carson-Newman are members of the South Atlantic Conference.
The Bobcats then lost 87-80 to Carson-Newman University on Sunday.
The Challenge was played at Appalachian State University’s Holmes Center in Boone instead of at the Williams Gymnasium on the Lees-McRae campus in Banner Elk as originally scheduled due to damage the gymnasium sustained from Hurricane Helene.
Eleven of the 12 players who saw action for Lees-McRae versus UVA-Wise scored points. Ja’Quavian Florence led the effort, with a game-best 20 points. He shot 50 percent from the field ( 6-of-12) and made 7-of-8 free throws. He also pulled down 10 rebounds. D.J. Kent added 16 points and made 7-of-10 field goal attempts. Nigel Okwakol chipped in 12 points for the Bobcats.
UVA-Wise had four players score in double digits. Lav Cvetkovic’ was the team’s leader in the statistical category with 17 points. Evan Ramsey added 16, Bradley Dean 15, and Patrick Shelley 14.
Shelley also led the Highland Cavaliers in rebounds with 10. Additionally, Ramsey blocked 3 shots.
The Bobcats won the points in the paint battle by a 42-34 margin and claimed a whopping 35-13 advantage in bench points. They also had 22 fast break points, and UVA-Wise had 20. Lees-McRae had 17 second-chance points, while the Highland Cavaliers had 11.
UVA-Wise had more points off turnovers (19-15).
The Bobcats took a 44-25 cushion at halftime but were outscored 57-43 in the last half as UVA-Wise rallied, although still falling short at the game’s end. The score was tied five times and had seven lead changes.
Lees-McRae made 32-of-71 field goal attempts (45.1 percent) and 15-of-22 free throws (68.2 percent). The Bobcats also shot 36.4 percent (8-of-22) from beyond the 3-point arch.
The Highland Cavaliers shot 40 percent from the field (26-of-65), 30.4 percent from 3-point range (7-of-23), and 65.7 percent from the foul line (23-of-35).
Carson-Newman defeated King 92-80 in Saturday’s opening game of the tournament. Three Eagles scored 20 or more points as they staved off a second-half run from King. Jack Browder led Carson-Newman in scoring, finishing with 24 points on 9-of-14 shooting. John Zhao scored 21 on eight made field goals, securing a double-double with his 11 rebounds. Trey Hubbard collected 20 points.
Mikhail Pocknett led the King Tornado with 24 points.
In the first game of the Challenge on Sunday, UVA-Wise (1-1) beat King University 81-71.
Anderson Cummins led all scorers, finishing with 21 points. He was one of four Highland Cavaliers to finish in double digits, along with Dean (19), Ramsey (15) and Shelley (12).
Ramsey had a double-double, adding 13 rebounds.
Jordan Akal finished with 15 points for the Tornado. He shot 8-of-12 from the free-throw line.
Pocknett and Seth Cullen both added 12 points, while Petar Mijatovic had 10 points.
Pocknett also led the Tornado in rebounds with nine.
After King pulled within two points (21-19), the Highland Cavaliers went on an 11-2 scoring run over the next three minutes to claim a 32-21 lead with just over five-and-a-half minutes remaining in the half.
King (0-2) then closed the half on an 8-2 run over the final three minutes but still trailed 40-31.
Cullen nailed a 3-pointer coming out of the half, and Abdel-Majid Dylan Gory then made a dunk to cut UVA-Wise’s lead to 40-36.
But UVA-Wise’s lead reached 62-47 with 11:26 to play, before King used a 16-7 scoring run to pull within five at 69-64 with 3:32 left to play. But the Tornado could not cut the deficit any further, and the Highland Cavaliers went a perfect 6-of-6 from the free throw line in the last minute to hang on for the victory.
UVA-Wise shot 43.1 percent from the field (25-of-58) and 73.5 percent from the foul line (25-of-34).
The Highland Cavaliers scored 30 points in the paint and 8 off turnovers. They also had 27 bench points and 11 second chance points.
UVA-Wise outrebounded King 45-37.
King shot only 36.9 percent from the field (24-of-65). The Tornado went 17-of-25 from the free throw line and had 24 second chance points. Additionally, King had 19 bench points and 12 off turnovers.
UVA-Wise and King were both 6-of-26 in three-point shooting (23.1 percent).
Five different Bobcats recorded double-digit points, but Lees-McRae fell to Carson-Newman, 87-80, in the final game of the Challenge on Sunday.
Okwakol had a team-high 15 points on 5-of-9 shooting from the field. He also made six rebounds and blocked a shot. Florence and Anthony Parker each tallied 14 points.
Kent added 13 points and hauled in nine rebounds, two assists, and one steal in 27 minutes of action. Nico Ashley rounded out the Bobcats in double-digit scoring with 12 points on 5-of-9 shooting from the field.
Nick Brenegan scored 24 points, followed by Braden Ilic’s 16, Browder’s 12, and Hubbard’s 10 for the Eagles.
Carson-Newman led all but 47 seconds in the game.
Parker knocked down a three with 11:29 left in the first half off an assist from Drew Redmond as the Bobcats tied the game at 13-13. But Carson-Newman pushed its lead to double digits at 27-17 with a 14-4 run. Lees-McRae then cut the deficit to five (35-30) at the halftime break with a basket from Ashley.
Carson-Newman maintained the lead in the second half. Matt Bilbrey also played a key factor for the Eagles then, scoring eight points in one minute-and-27-second stretch by making two treys and a layup.
The Eagles led 70-56 with 7:29 remaining before Lee’s-McRae (1-1) steadily cut that 14-point deficit in half to end the game.
The Eagles (3-1) shot 52.5 percent (31-of-59) from the field and 77.3 percent from the foul line (17-of-22). In 3-point shooting, they were 8-of-23 (34.8 percent).
Carson-Newman also outrebounded the Bobcats 40-38.
Lees-McRae made 29-of-70 field goals (41.4 percent) and just 12-of-24 free throws (50 percent). The Bobcats hit 40 percent of its shots beyond 3-point range (10-of-25) and had a 34-16 advantage in bench point scoring.
However, Lees-McRae (1-1) had only 3 fast-break points compared to 16 for the Eagles.