ST. PAUL, Minn. – The Concordia-St. Paul men's basketball team (3-13, 1-9 NSIC) stormed back from an 18 point second half deficit to force overtime before falling to St. Cloud State (6-9, 3-7 NSIC) 87-78 on Saturday night at Gangelhoff Center.
 
Trailing 52-34 with 13:39 to play, Concordia took control with a massive 43-22 run to take a late 77-74 lead before the Huskies knocked down three free throws in the final 8.1 seconds to send it to an extra session. From there, SCSU scored 10 of 11 points after regulation to hand CSP an 87-78 loss. The Golden Bears dropped to 7-25 in the all-time series and 5-11 on their home court against St. Cloud State.
 
After connecting on an efficient 52.4% (11-21) from the floor and 40.0% (4-10) from three-point range, CSP was even better after the break as they hit 55.6% (15-27) and 45.5% (5-11), respectively, in the final 20 minutes of regulation. The Golden Bears also took advantage of their opportunities from the free throw line in the second half as they knocked down 93.8% (15-16) en route to finishing the game at 85.0% (17-20) from the charity stripe.
 
St. Cloud State aided their effort on the glass as they used a 47-26 rebounding edge and a 19-2 edge on the offensive boards to finish with a 20-5 advantage in second chance points.
 
Antwan Kimmons put up his fourth 30-point effort of the season as he filled it up with 30 points, seven rebounds, seven assists and three steals on an incredible 10-13 from the floor and 10-11 from the charity stripe.
 
Ian Sluice gave CSP a big boost from the bench as he hit 4-6 from deep and 5-7 overall to finish with a career-best 17 points. Jacob Everson added a solid 13 points, five boards, five assists, two steals and two blocks while hitting 5-9 from the floor.
 
Matthew Willert led the Huskies with 25 points, five rebounds and five assists in the win.
 
After a fairly even start to the contest, SCSU built up a 21-13 with seven straight points. The lead remained in that range for much of the rest of the half until a late 6-0 run pushed it to 38-27 in favor of the guests at halftime.
 
The run was doubled to 12-0 in the opening minute of the second half as back-to-back threes pushed it to 44-27 before it eventually grew to a game-high 18 points at 52-34. Still down 17 at 54-37 with 11:25 to go, CSP rattled off a timely 14-2 run over the next three minutes to trim it all the way down to five at 56-51. They were unable to trim it down to a one possession game until an even bigger 9-0 run with 1:42 left on the clock turned a 74-68 deficit into a 77-74 lead. It was Sluice who hit the big shot as he buried a corner three off a feed from Kimmons with 25 seconds left before Kimmons knocked down a pair at 9.1 seconds to push it to 77-74. SCSU responded, however, as they used a made free throw, an offensive rebound on a miss, and two more made free throws to extend the game to overtime.
 
It was all Huskies in the extra frame they followed up an early Sean Mathieu made free throw with 10 points in a row to secure the 87-78 victory.
 
Concordia hits the road for a four-game road trip starting next weekend as they travel to Bemidji State and Minnesota Crookston.