MIAMI SHORES, Fla. – The Carthage College men's basketball team opened their trip in the sunshine state on a dark note Monday afternoon, falling late to Eastern Connecticut State University, 78-71.
 
The loss drops the Red Men to 5-6 on the season, while the Warriors improve to 7-2 with the win.
 
"Very physical game with not many free throws attempted," said head coach Bosko Djurickovic.  "Give Eastern a lot of credit, they are a very good and balanced team who won 26 games last year and have a couple guys can really make plays.  This was a similar game to the Illinois Wesleyan one, where I felt we led for a majority of the game and didn't finish.  We need to closeout games better moving forward.  Light practice tomorrow, which is needed for some of the guys who played a lot minutes today, then back at it Wednesday against an 8-1 PSU-Harrisburg team."
 
The Red Men got to the rim early and often in the first half as a 22-10 advantage in the paint gave Carthage the largest lead of the first half at behind a 12-2 run that turned a tight one-point game into a 31-20 lead for Carthage at the 7:56 mark of the half.  The Warriors answer from deep though, as Eastern Connecticut State made nine of their 22 three-point attempts, cutting the Red Men lead to just three at the half, 40-37.   Jordon Kedrowski led all players in the first half with 14 points, which included 4-6 from three.
 
Carthage opened the second half hot and built a nine-point lead, 46-37, to open the half and would lead most of the half but after taking a three-point lead, 71-68, with 4:42 remaining, Carthage went without a point and a 10-0 run down the stretch by the Warriors cost the Red Men the game. 
 
The Red Men finished 31-64 from the field for the game, but after shooting .515 in the first half and .417 from three, Carthage was held to .452 in the second half from the field and just .188 from three on 2-11.  ECSU finished 28-62 from the field and 12-30 from three.
 
Kedrowski played the full 40 minutes and finished with a team-high 20 in the loss, going 8-18 from the field and 4-8 from three, while leading the team with seven boards as well.  Kienan Baltimore and Preston Laketa each finished with 14 points and shot well, going 7-13 and 6-11 from the field respectively.
 
The Red Men will return to action in Miami on Wednesday, December 19^th when Carthage takes on Penn State-Harrisburg at 6:00 p.m. EST.