The Fort Lewis College men’s and women’s basketball teams both took down Colorado Christian University on Saturday inside Whalen Gymnasium.
The women began the night by scoring a tight win, 67-66, over CCU.
The men followed with a dominant 87-58 victory over the Cougars.
The women’s contest was a game of runs. FLC jumped out to a 16-1 lead with Kelsey Sorenson, Alyssa Adams and Piper Terry all knocking down 3-pointers. Adams scored 9 of her 18 points in the quarter to get FLC off to a strong start.
The Skyhawks took a 22-11 lead into the second, but CCU started the quarter with a 10-2 run to cut the lead to 24-21.
Sydney Candelaria, however, got hot for the Skyhawks and scored 13 of her game-high 24 points in the quarter to help FLC take its biggest lead of the game, 45-29, into halftime.
To start the third quarter, CCU went on a 14-2 run to close the gap. Terry and Claudia Vidal responded with buckets for FLC and the Skyhawks stayed ahead of CCU, leading 58-53 to begin the fourth.
CCU made the first two baskets of the fourth quarter to cut FLC’s lead to one. No more than four points separated the teams the rest of the way. Candelaria drained a 3-pointer to give Fort Lewis a 61-57 lead, but the Skyhawks didn’t make another field goal until the final minute.
CCU took its first lead of the game, 66-64, with 40 seconds left in the contest.
Candelaria, however, got fouled making a shot 11 second later to tie the game. She then sunk the free throw to put FLC back in front, 67-66. CCU held for the last shot, but it dinged off the front of the rim and the Skyhawks got the win.
FLC is now 2-8 overall and 1-3 in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference. CCU slipped to 3-6, 0-3.
The men’s game started a little closer than the women’s with FLC leading 10-6 a little over four minutes in. The Skyhawks then started to pull away and went on a 24-6 run that saw Riley Farris, Akuel Kot and Brendan La Rose all sink 3-pointers.
The teams traded baskets after that, but Junior Garbrah drained a late trey to put FLC up 46-26 at halftime.
The Skyhawks continued passing well in the second half to find an open man for some easy buckets and led by as many as 40 points, 82-42. CCU closed the gap a little down the stretch, but didn’t get any closer than 29 points to FLC.
Farris scored 21 to lead FLC. Kot came out hot and scored eight of FLC’s first 15 points and finished with 20. Brenden Boatwright scored 12 and Will Wittman added 9 for Fort Lewis. The Skyhawks are now 7-3, 3-1 while CCU slid to 3-6, 0-3.
The Skyhawks will play at home again on Friday and Saturday, taking on Regis University and then the Colorado School of Mines. The women will tip off at 6 p.m. Friday and 5 p.m. Saturday with the men starting afterwards at roughly 8 p.m. and 7 p.m.
