PIPPA PASSES, Ky. -- Throughout the second half of the 2024-25 season, the story of the Shawnee State men's basketball program could be defined in one word.
Resilency.
Shawnee State, who sat 5-10 overall and 0-3 in the River States Conference on Jan. 8 -- and were in sixth and last place in the RSC East Division -- sealed up one of the greatest stories in Shawnee State Athletics history Saturday afternoon in a River States Conference contest at Alice Lloyd (Ky.).
The Bears led for 31:16 out of the 40-minute affair against the Eagles and never trailed over the contest's final 30:58 en route to a 79-70 victory that gave SSU its 11th victory over its last 13 contests to end the regular season as well as the River States Conference's East Division Championship in the regular season finale for the men, who played at Alice Lloyd's Perry Campus Center Saturday afternoon in Pippa Passes, Ky.
Saturday's victory moved Shawnee State to 8-1 in contests decided by single-digits during its 11-for-13 stretch.
Game Summary/Sharing is Caring
Shawnee State's unselfishness again paid dividends in multiple facets as the Bears finished with a positive assist-to-turnover ratio, posting 13 assists to 11 turnovers as a group and nabbing a plus-five turnover margin.
As a result, the Bears (16-12, 11-5 River States Conference) were able to shoot 33-of-58 (56.9 percent) from the field and 5-of-10 (50 percent) from three-point range in the contest -- all while turning 16 Alice Lloyd (19-8, 10-5 River States Conference) miscues into 23 points off of turnovers to collect a plus-five advantage in that category as well.
Gardner stays on go
Arguably the key cog in Shawnee State's 11-2 push to end the regular season, graduate student Cory Gardner was ready to seize the moment from the opening tipoff.
Down by a 6-2 margin to begin the game, Gardner proceeded to score six of Shawnee State's next 14 points, with his last pair of tallies during that singular spurt tying the score at 16 apiece off of a steal and layup at the other end. That takeaway was a key piece to what ultimately ended up being an 11-0 run, which gave the Bears a 23-16 advantage with 8:19 to play. From there, Shawnee State led the rest of the way, and never led by less than five points over the course of the contest at that.
Gardner ultimately scored a team-high 12 points on 6-of-9 shooting in the opening half alone -- and went on to finish with 18 points, six rebounds, five steals, two assists and a block while going 9-of-14 from the floor to fill up the stat sheet once again. The six rebounds and five steals were each team-highs while the 18 points matched a team-best.
With Gardner in the lineup, Shawnee State has gone 11-3 in the 14 games that the graduate student has played in -- and 11-2 in the contests that he's started. Gardner finished the regular season averaging 16.4 points, 5.4 rebounds, 3.9 assists and 2.4 steals on 57 percent shooting and a 42.1 percent three-point mark.
Beard eclipses 1,200-point mark, puts self inside top-10 in all-time scoring in SSU career
Adding to what has been a proflic career at Shawnee State, graduate student lead guard Tre Beard was again tremendous in helping seal the deal.
Beard, who matched Gardner's team-high of 18 points, nabbed 12 points, four rebounds and two assists in the second half while going 3-of-5 from the field and 2-of-3 from three-point range. The standout talent scored 10 of those 12 second half points over the first 13:39 of the second half, with his last three-pointer giving Shawnee State its largest lead of the game, 67-51, with 6:21 to go.
For his career, Beard now has 1,211 points which put the grad student past Jeff Fraley for 10th place all-time in Shawnee State program history in career points inside the program. Beard now has 236 career three-pointers to his credit as well for the season -- which is just 25 off of Fraley's all-time single-season record of 261.
Beard has also led Shawnee State to a 103-49 overall record during his stretch of time with the Bears.
Shawnee State adds to growing men's basketball tradition
Having already clinched a program record sixth consecutive winning season prior to the beginning of Saturday's contest, the end of Saturday's regular season championship-sealing win adds to what has been unchartered waters for the Shawnee State men's basketball program over the past six seasons.
From the 2019-20 campaign until now, Shawnee State has gone 124-60 with two regular season conference championships, a conference tournament championship, and a national championship while also appearing in the conference semifinals in four out of the past five seasons as well.
The six consecutive above .500 seasons are a first for the Shawnee State men's basketball program in program history -- as from the 1988-89 to 2018-19 seasons, the Bears had no more than three consecutive winning seasons in any stretch of time.
Additional
AJ Belton and Donovan Lovelace posted 20 points, seven rebounds, three assists and two blocks while going 10-of-13 from the field between them for strong efficiency between them, while Marcos Vazquez and Preston Saia each posted six points.
Belton, Vazquez, Saia and Elkin Ramirez, who combined for 25 bench points, also combined to go 11-of-17 from the field (64.7 percent) as the quartet's efficiency proved to be huge for Shawnee State.
Ezra McKee and Feisal Crumby III each posted four points while Damon Charles also saw time in the RSC East Division clinching win.
The official matchups to begin the River States Conference Tournament, which will be Wednesday, Feb. 26, will be posted to www.ssubears.com as soon as they are announced by RSC officials.
