The Lindenwood men's basketball team snapped its losing streak by defeating Missouri-St. Louis, 86-77, to close of the 2016 calendar year.
 
It took nearly 14 minutes, but once the Lions gained the lead over Missouri-St. Louis, they would fail to relinquish it. The Tritons rattled off eight straight points after a couple three-pointers before Chandler Diekvoss put Lindenwood on the scoreboard with a layup.
 
Jackson Price came off the bench firing. Less than five seconds into the game, the sophomore drilled a three off an inbound play to start the momentum for the Lions. After the Tritons built their lead to 10 midway through the half, Lindenwood scored seven-straight points on a couple buckets by Diekvoss and a layup by Rayko Dundalov.
 
At the 6:18 mark in the half, LJ McIntosh nailed a three to give the Lions a 29-27 lead. Lindenwood would grow the lead to nine before halftime, going on an 18-11 run. Price made a three-pointer with 26 seconds left and made the free throw that came along with it after being fouled.
 
Lindenwood led 47-38 at the break, led by Diekvoss and Price, who had 16 and 13 points, respectively. Diekvoss also led on the glass for the Lions with five boards, while Dominique Dobbs added four rebounds. As a team, the Lions shot 50 percent from behind the arc, and had a 54.5 percent mark from the field.
 
The Lions began the second half on a 15-7 run, capped by a three-pointer by Diekvoss at the 15:39 mark. Adam Pohlman recorded assists on the three-straight possessions to open the half before the Tritons cut the lead down to eight with under 13 minutes remaining with a three-pointer and a pair of free throws, but a long ball from McIntosh put the advantage back to 10 for Lindenwood.
 
Free throws by Pohlman made the score 85-71 with two and a half minutes remaining, the team's biggest lead in over 10 minutes. The final point of the game would come from Max Meylor on the front end of a one-and-one with 31 seconds left. The score would hold as 86-77 as the buzzer sounded.
 
For the game, the Lions assisted on 18 of 34 made buckets. The team increased its shooting percentage from behind the arc to 52.2 percent and 59.6 percent from the field. Diekvoss led the team with 29 points and eight rebounds, while adding four dimes to his stat line. Pohlman tallied six assists, all in the second half, while Price scored 15 points and McIntosh poured in 13 with 12 being from long range.
 
The win breaks the three-game losing streak for Lindenwood to improve its record to 10-5. The Lions host Cumberland (Tenn.) on Monday at 7 p.m. from Hyland Arena.