GREENVILLE, Ill. - The Blue Jays' St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference opener turned into a shootout as they fell short in a loss to the Panthers on Wednesday night.
Westminster College (1-6) trailed 61-54 at halftime, but rallied to tie the game at 127-all on sophomore guard Landon Harrison's 3-pointer with 2 minutes, 10 seconds left. The Blue Jays then took their only lead of the second half on sophomore forward Jaxon Althaus' layup with 1:52 to play.
Greenville University (2-5) pulled even again at 129-all on a layup by Dustin Bankowski with 1:12 remaining. The Panthers went in front to stay on Sontiago Grady's layup with :41 to go and Riley Simmons hit 1-of-2 free throws with :23 left to make it 132-129.
Westminster closed within a point on a Harrison layup with :14 to play. The Blue Jays had a couple of chances to pull off a dramatic victory, but missed two 3-pointers in the last :03.
Althaus hit 17-of-26 shots to spark Westminster with a game-high 36 points and Harrison was 14-of-21 in following with 31 points. Sophomore guard Ethan Thompson connected on seven 3s in logging 30 points as the Blue Jays shot 56 percent (55-of-98) overall and 39 percent (11-of-28) behind the arc.
Junior guard Omar Wright chipped in with 15 points for Westminster. Wright and Harrison both pulled down nine rebounds as the two teams finished in a 54-all stalemate on the boards.
Grady and Simmons responded with 21 points apiece to lead seven players in double figures for Greenville, which shot 46 percent (50-of-109) overall and 35 percent (18-of-51) from 3-point range. Quincy Pinkard and Rakim Murphy both supplied 18 points.
Justin Cross contributed 11 points and Henry Johnson and Barry Nixon each had 10.
The Blue Jays host Iowa Wesleyan University in a SLIAC matchup at 3 p.m. Saturday.