The concordia men's basketball team improved to 3-1 on the year after surviving with a 75-71 win over wisconsin-river falls saturday night at the gangelhoff center behind senior james metcalf’s (killeen, tx) career-high 23 points, with 16 coming in the second half.

the falcons of uw-river falls jumped out to a 5-0 lead and extended it to as many as 12 points in the first half. The golden bears chipped away at the lead and trailed 37-34 at halftime. Senior jason birr (burnsville, mn) led the golden bears in the first half scoring ten points. He would finish the night with 14.

sophomore craig heiman (marshall, wi) scored the first seven points of the second half for concordia and gave the golden bears their first lead 50-49 with a three point field goal at 11:01 of the second half. From there metcalf went on a scoring spree of his own, scoring ten straight points for concordia, giving the golden bears a 60-53 lead, their largest lead of the game.

the falcons rallied to tie the game at 65-65 with with 1:49 to play, but after a pair of free throws by freshman matt hackl (seymour, wi), metcalf converted a traditional three point play to give concordia a 70-65 lead and they would hold on for the win.

metcalf finished the night shooting 8-11 from the floor, including 1-2 from three point range and 6-8 from the free throw line. Heiman shot 5-10, with 2-6 from three and 3-5 from the line.

both metcalf and heiman finished with a team-high nine rebounds.

wisconsin-river falls was led in scoring by nate robertson with 22 points, while courtney davis added 16 and willie wright 15.

as a team, concordia shot 25-57 (.439) from the field and only 7-20 (.350) from three point range. They struggled from the freee throw line converting 18-287 (.667).

uwrf was held to 23-56 (.411) from the floor and only 6-18 (.333) from three point range and 19-27 (.704) from the free throw line.

the golden bears outrebounded the falcons 41-34 and commited six more turnovers, giving up the ball 15 times compared to nine for uwrf.

concordia will travel to minnesota duluth to take on the bulldogs on tuedsay, nov. 27 at 7:00.

box score - cu 75, uw-river falls 71