By Courtney Zenner – Collegiate Staff
The GRCC Men’s Basketball gets their first win of the season on the road against Cornerstone’s JV team on Monday night. GRCC won 93-86.
Sophomore Jeffrey Drake-Todd posted his second double-double in a row, finishing the game with 21 points and 10 assists. Sophomore Arthur Pearson added 23 points. Freshman guard, Bryce Elliot stepped up tonight finishing with 18 points.
“Keeping an up tempo pace and being aggressive to the rim worked well for us,” said GRCC head coach Luke Bronkema.
Jake Brubaker of Cornerstone had 30 points and eight rebounds.
“We pushed the ball and finished better in transition. We didn’t have nearly as many turnovers as they did. However, they killed us on the glass,” said Bronkema.
The game was fast paced from start to finish. GRCC brought defensive energy and pressure forcing Cornerstone to have 21 turnovers. Drake-Todd finished the game with 7 steals.
Cornerstone finished the game with 64 rebounds compared to GRCC’s 45 rebounds.
GRCC lead at halftime 43-31, but stretched that lead to 20 for most of the second half. The game got a little tighter at the end.
“Rather than closing out the game strong we took a big deep breathe and everyone stopped being aggressive. We thought we would just let the time run out, but there was way too much time for that … so in the future we need to continue to be aggressive finishing out games and playing our game rather than trying to stall with six minutes to go,” said Bronkema. “That wasn’t the game plan at all. Once they dropped into a zone, that was just kind of the way it went.”
“We need to communicate and be able to trust our teammates in every situation to be successful at the end of the day,” said Drake-Todd.
GRCC will host their home opener of the season at 7:30 PM Wednesday, Nov. 9, against Grace Bible College JV.
