Johnson City Times

The Milligan University men's basketball team came up short on Tuesday evening when they squared off with Reinhardt. The Eagles walked away with a narrow victory, 79-82, as the Buffaloes comeback fell short.

Milligan drops to 5-11 overall and 5-8 in Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) play. Reinhardt improves their record to 8-9 overall and 8-6 in AAC matchups. The game featured a dozen ties and 10 lead changes over the 40 minutes of back-and-forth action.

The game started off with both teams trading threes for their first baskets. The back-and-forth action continued as both teams reached double-figures and were deadlocked at 13 five and a half minutes in.

Reinhardt was able to utilize multiple fast breaks to go on a 16-5 run midway through the half to gain their largest lead at 29-18. The lead was cut to two (33-31) with only five seconds before Brandon Barron of the Eagles fired up a deep three at the buzzer and banked it in. The Buffaloes went into the locker room trailing 36-31.

Milligan came out of the locker room firing on all cylinders as they scored 20 points in the first eight minutes. This helped them take their largest lead of the day, 54-49, with 11:26 to play. Reinhardt was not going to be put away easily, as they battled back to take a three-point lead, 70-67, with 5:28 remaining. The Buffs battled back but were unable to overcome the deficit as they came back within one (80-79) but were unable to pull out the victory.

Dylan Bartley (14pts) led the way for the Buffs as five players reached double-figures. Sam Gold (13pts), Eli Walls (12pts), Jackson Gabriel (12pts), and Julian Wilson (12pts) were the other top scorers. Drew Greene tallied the most assists in the matchup as he garnered six.

The Buffs had 18 assists on 25 made baskets, shot 54 percent, sanknine-of-19 three-pointers and 20-of-27 free throws. Milligan's bench outscored Reinhardt 40-15.

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