The Lindenwood men's basketball team was handed a 93-69 setback by the Missouri-St. Louis Tritons on Tuesday evening in St. Louis, Mo. The loss came during the first-ever GLVC contest for the Lions, moving the team's record to 3-2 on the season and 0-1 during conference play.

GAME OVERVIEW
Missouri-St. Louis was in control of the game from the beginning, scoring 12 of the first 14 points over the opening 5:31 of play. TJ Crockett promptly responded with a made three-point field goal, getting the Lions within seven points of the home team at 12-5 with just over 14 minutes to go before halftime.

Lindenwood struggled to find its shot throughout the first half, shooting just 31.3 percent (10-of-32) from the field, including only 7.7 percent (1-of-13) from three-point range.

On the other end of the court, Missouri-St. Louis knocked down 43.8 percent of its shots (14-of-32), and 11-of-12 from the charity stripe, resulting in a 42-25 halftime lead for the Tritons.

Lindenwood improved its shooting performance dramatically during the second half of play, hitting 15-of-27 from the field (55.6 percent). Unfortunately for the Lions, Missouri-St. Louis was even more efficient with its shooting in the second half, connecting on 60.6 percent of its shots (20-of-33) to keep Lindenwood's deficit in double digits throughout the second half of play.

In the end, the Tritons strong shooting led them to a 93-69 wire-to-wire victory over the Lions.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE
- Vijay Blackmon picked up his fourth consecutive game with at least 10 points, finishing with a career-high 24 points (8-of-18 FG) to pace the Lindenwood offense.
- Crockett added exactly 20 points (7-of-17 FG, 5-of-5 FT), and has now scored at least 20 points in each game this season.
- Crockett and Blackmon each set new career-high marks in rebounding. Crockett grabbed a team-high seven boards, while Blackmon had six rebounds.
- Cameron Scales continued to excel from three-point range, knocking down a team-high four triples in the game, as he finished with 16 points on 6-of-10 shooting.
- Scales has now made multiple three-point field-goals in four of the five games this season.
- As a team, Lindenwood shot 42.4 percent from the field (25-of-59).
- The Lions narrowly lost the rebounding battle to the Tritons, 36-35.

QUOTABLE
Lindenwood head coach Kyle Gerdeman
"All credit goes to UMSL tonight," said Gerdeman. "They did a great job with their system on both ends of the floor. I think we learned a valuable lesson of how good the GLVC will be. Our guys have done a great job learning and improving from day one, and I think that tomorrow will be no different. We will move on to preparing for Florida Southern and continue to get better every day."
 
UP NEXT
The Lions will head to Lakeland, Fla. on Saturday afternoon for a 5:30 p.m. (4:30 p.m. central) matchup with No. 22 Florida Southern.