By Brian Ramsey
OBU Sports Information

ARKADELPHIA – The Ouachita Baptist University men’s basketball team had its best offensive outing of the season on Tuesday at home in a 95-72 win over Champion Christian College.

It was the final non-conference game for the Tigers (2-7). Ouachita resumes Great American Conference play on Saturday, hosting Arkansas-Monticello at 3 p.m. seeking its first league victory of the year.

Despite ending up with a season-high in points, Ouachita struggled to find a groove early in Tuesday’s win over Champion Christian (2-9). The two sets of Tigers exchanged leads throughout the first 13 minutes of the game, with CC hanging with Ouachita with a 29-28 lead with 7:31 remaining before halftime.

That’s when Ouachita found a rhythm. Down by one, the Tigers posted a 12-0 run to grab their first double-digit lead of the game at the 4:48 mark on a highlight-reel dunk by Tylar Haynes from the assist of Alex Scariolo.

CC responded with a its first basket in three minutes to trim the Ouachita lead back down to single digits, but the purple-and-white Tigers put together another 12-0 run, this time capped by a three-pointer by Jacob Street with 31 seconds remaining. That trey put Ouachita up by 17, and the Tigers went on to hold a 15-point lead of 52-37 at the halftime break.

Ouachita maintained its double-digit advantage throughout the second half, outscoring CC 43-35 in the period. The Tigers went up by 20 on a dunk by T’Vondrick Henry assisted by Marvin Williams-Dunn with 11:37 remaining. The largest lead for Ouachita came in the final two minutes with a 26-point advantage on two different occasions.

Ma’Darius Hobson led Ouachita with 23 points, his third 20-plus game of the year. Haynes finished with 15 points and a team-high eight rebounds. Street finished with 13 points. Leon Kalinic chipped in with 11 points in 16 minutes off the bench.

As a team, Ouachita finished the game with season-highs in points (95), field goals made (36), three-pointers made (11), and steals (12).