Box Score On a night when the Lindenwood basketball program honored one of its all-time greats, Earl Austin Jr. the Lions fell to the Maryville Saints 87-74 in a hard fought game at the Hyland Arena in St. Charles, Mo.
 
The game started with Brandon Marquardt hitting an open three which gave the Lions the 3-0 lead. Unfortunately, that was the last time the home team would hold a lead. After missing its first shot of the game, the Saints hit their next seven-of-eight shots to take an eight-point lead.
 
Lindenwood cut its deficit down to two with just over 10 minutes to play in the first half but the Saints continued its hot shooting. Maryville went six-of-nine over a five minute span to take a 10-point lead and that would be its lead at the half.  For the opening 20 minutes, the visitors shot 61 percent from the field.
 
The second half started with the Saints pushing the lead up to 18 with 11:06 to play in the contest. The home team would not go down easily though. Lindenwood answered the big deficit with an 8-0 run to cut the Saints lead to 10 with just over nine minutes to play.
 
With the lead down to 10, the Saints would score the game's next six points to extend the lead back up to 16. Again, the Lions would not go away. Darris Smith hit a running jumper in the lane to cut the Maryville lead to seven. After the Saints scored on a layup, Marquardt took an open three from the corner that did everything but go in which would have cut the deficit to six.
 
After the miss, the Saints used all of the shot clock and hit a three with just three second left to shoot. That three was a dagger into the Lions heart and Maryville held on for the big nonconference road win over Lindenwood.
 
Smith once again led Lindenwood in scoring with 20 points on seven-of-11 shooting. Tyler Ressel chipped in with 17 and Marquardt scored 11. Aaron Ramirez led the team in rebounds with five.
 
The Lions shot 50 percent from the field compared to the Saints 55 percent. Maryville went 11-for-24 from behind the three-point line and Lindenwood made just five-of-14 from distance. For only the second time this season the Lions were outrebounded 29-26.
 
Before the game, the Lindenwod basketball program retired Earl Austin Jr's #41 uniform. Austin is a Lindenwood Athletics Hall of Famer and is the programs all-time leading scorer.  
 
The loss drops Lindenwood to 2-4 on the season. The Lions don't have much time to think about it as the team will be back in action Thursday night against Benedictine-Springfield at the Hyland Arena.