Box Score
RICHMOND, VA – The Livingstone men's basketball team erased a 14-point second-half deficit, but ultimately fell short against the Virginia Union Panthers 66-63 Monday evening.
Senior forward Jarred Stockton led the Blue Bears with 20 points while sophomore guard Greg Henry added 17 points for the Blue Bears. Junior center Virgil Taylor led the Blue Bears on the boards with nine rebounds.
Livingstone got off to a quick 6-0 lead over the Panthers in first minute and a half, but Virginia Union was able to battle back and tie the game at 10 with 13:21 left in the first half. Virginia Union took a 14-11 lead over the Blue Bears with 11:35 to play, but a Stockton jumper cut the deficit to one with 11:21 to play.
After Stockton's made jumper the Blue Bears went cold shooting over the next seven minutes. Over that time the Panthers went on a 10-0 run and increased their lead to 11 points at 24-13 with 4:32 to play before halftime. Aaron Caruthers ended the Livingstone drought with 3:10 to play. Virginia Union's largest lead of the half of 13 points came with 12 seconds left, but a Greg Henry jumper at the buzzer brought the teams to their halftime score of 30-19.
Greg Henry and Jarred Stockton led the Blue Bears at halftime, each scoring five points and Henry also pulled down five rebounds. The Blue Bears shot 26.7 percent from the field in the first half.
The second half was a complete turnaround for the Blue Bears as they shot 60 percent from the field. Virginia Union got their lead up to 14 points less than two minutes into the half and led by 12 points at 37-25 with 16:32 left in the contest. Trailing by 11, the Blue Bears rattled off an 11-0 run and got within one point with 14:15 left in the game.
Virginia Union weathered the Blue Bear attack and got their lead back to six at 44-38. The teams battled back and forth over the next six minutes and Livingstone was able to tie the game at 51-51 after an Aaron Wilson jumper and took their first lead since the 14:27 mark of the first half after Henry connected on one of two free throws with 6:07 to play.
The final six minutes of the second half were a knock-down, drag-out battle. Each team took turns leading the contest and Virginia Union found themselves up four with 2:51 to play, but the Blue Bears were back within one with 1:44 to play. Livingstone trailed by three with 1:14 to play, but Henry hit another clutch shot to get within one with 58 seconds to play.
Two free throws put Virginia Union up three with 52 seconds left and with only 12 ticks on the clock, the Panthers had a chance to ice the game from the charity stripe, but couldn't covert. The Panthers missed the first of a one-and-one free-throw attempt, the Blue Bears rebounded and had a chance to tie the game with a three-pointer. The Blue Bears tried to get the ball to Stockton, but he wasn't open. The ball went to Megail Cannon who had to put up an off-balance three-pointer that fell short.
For the game the Blue Bears shot 43.3 percent from the field including 25 percent from the three-point line, but only 46.7 percent from the free-throw line. Livingstone was barely clipped on the boards 39-38 and committed two fewer turnovers.
With the loss, the Blue Bears fell to 8-8 overall and 5-4 in the CIAA while Virginia Union improved to 13-6 overall and 10-7 in the conference.
The Blue Bears will next host the Shaw Bears on Thursday evening at 7:30 p.m. to open CIAA Western Division play.
