ST. PAUL, Minn. – Another night, another dramatic finish at Gangelhoff Center as the Concordia-St. Paul men's basketball team (8-16, 6-12 NSIC) made it four wins in a row as they closed out the game on a 6-0 run to claim a 63-60 victory over Southwest Minnesota State (14-9, 10-8 NSIC) on Saturday afternoon.
 
Trailing 60-57 with 1:14 left on the clock, Antwan Kimmons knocked down a pair of free throws to cut it to one before Marcus Skeete drove in for a go-ahead layup with 28 seconds remaining. Kimmons added two more free throws with 4.3 seconds to go before the Golden Bears forced an off target contested jumper at the horn to secure the win.
 
The Golden Bears' four consecutive wins are their most since opening the 2018-19 campaign with four in a row, matching their highest total since closing out the 2015-16 regular season with five straight wins. CSP also continued their strong play in recent years with the Mustangs as they won their fifth in the last seven meetings with SMSU to improve to 15-32 in the all-time series.
 
While the Mustangs were the more efficient team from the floor on the night, shooting 47.1% (24-51) compared to 40.4% (21-52), Concordia proved to be more effective from beyond the arc and at the free throw line. CSP doubled up the Mustangs from three-point range with an 8-4 edge in made threes while they were nearly perfect from the free throw line, missing just one of 14 attempts (92.9%). The Golden Bears also won the transition battle as they tallied 17 fastbreak points while limiting SMSU to just six.
 
For the second night in a row, CSP's starting quartet of Antwan Kimmons, Marcus Skeete, Sean Mathieu and Jacob Everson all reached double figures in the win. Kimmons paced the Golden Bears with 17 points, six boards, three assists while knocking down all nine of his free throw attempts. Skeete hit 4-5 from the line to finish with 13 points, three rebounds and two assists.
 
Mathieu and Everson each contributed 10 points as Mathieu added four boards and two steals while Everson chipped in a pair of each.
 
Southwest Minnesota State's Jake Phipps finished with a game-high 22 points on 7-12 shooting while Dunwa Omot followed with 14 points in the loss.
 
Very little separated the two teams throughout the night with a combined 19 lead changes and 11 ties with neither team holding a lead larger than seven. The first half was even more tight with only two leads more than one possession as SMSU pushed it to four at 16-12 with a 5-0 run and again to four with another 5-0 run to make it 28-24 before a late Everson layup closed the gap to 28-26 at the half.
 
The Mustangs opened the second half with back-to-back buckets to push their lead to six at 32-26, but CSP quickly responded with a pair of threes from Skeete and John Grigsby to tie it back up. SMSU answered with nine of the next 11 points to build their largest lead of the night at 41-34 with 14:53 to play, but once again the momentum swung back the other way as Kimmons and Everson combined for a 9-0 run to regain the lead at 43-41. That proved to be the first of seven lead changes over a four minute stretch until a 6-0 run put the Golden Bears in front at 57-51 with 5:11 to go.
 
The back-and-forth play continued to the finish as the Mustangs embarked timely 9-0 burst to regain the lead at 60-57 with just over a minute to go, setting the stage for the late game heroics for Concordia.
 
Concordia will look to carry their momentum on the road as they travel to Augustana on Friday and Wayne State on Saturday.