Box Score

FAYETTEVILLE, NC – The Livingstone men's basketball team was unable to stop the league's leading scorer, Michael Carpenter, Thursday night as the Blue Bears fell 80-67 to the Fayetteville State Broncos.

Senior forward Megail Cannon led the Blue Bears with 17 points.  Sophomore forward Greg Henry added 14 points and nine rebounds in the losing effort while junior guard Donte Durant scored 13 points.  Fayetteville's Michael Carpenter scored a game-high 27 points.

The Blue Bears got out to the early lead 7-3, but Fayetteville turned the tables and went on a 14-0 run to take a 17-7 lead with 12:19 to play in the first half.  Livingstone was able to get back within five at 21-16 with 8:45 to play, but another Bronco run got the lead back to double-digits at 28-18 with just over seven minutes to play.

Fayetteville was able to continue the push against the Blue Bears and opened a 15-point advantage with just over five minutes left, but Livingstone was able to minimize the damage in the final minutes to trail by 11 at 45-34 at halftime.

Greg Henry led the Blue Bears in the first half with 12 points and five rebounds while Donte Durant added eight points.  Fayetteville's Michael Carpenter scored 20 of the Broncos 45 points in the first half.

In the second half the two teams battled back and forth.  Livingstone had good success at putting the ball in the bucket against the Broncos, but the all-important defensive always seemed to elude them.  The Blue Bears got their deficit down to seven points less than three minutes into the second half, but a 7-0 Fayetteville run got their lead back to 14 points at 57-43 with 11:21 showing on the clock.

Despite the double-digit deficit, Livingstone continued to press hard against the Broncos, but each time they seemed primed to cut the Fayetteville lead back under 10 points, the Bronco offense came up with a big bucket.

With the loss, the Blue Bears fell to 9-10 overall, 6-7 in the CIAA and 1-2 in the division.  Fayetteville improved to 6-12 overall, 3-9 in the conference and 1-2 in the division.

Livingstone will return home on Saturday evening when they host rival Johnson C. Smith.  Tipoff is slated for 7:30 p.m.