Men’s Basketball: Golden Hawk Down

Concordia Defeats Wilfrid Laurier at Concordia Classic Tournament

SportsJulian McKenzie — Published October 10, 2015

Concordia’s men’s basketball team won 79-60 over the Wilfrid Laurier Golden Hawks this past Friday evening during their annual pre-season Concordia Classic Tournament at the Concordia Gymnasium.

The Stingers earned their second win at the Concordia Classic and are now tied for first place with the University of Prince Edward Island, whom they will play on Saturday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. to decide the winner of the tournament.

“[I’m] very happy with the way we competed for 40 minutes,” said Stingers men’s basketball coach Rastko Popovic. “We buckled down defensively. [Laurier] scored 93 points last night, we held them to 60 and I still think there’s space for improvement.”

Concordia scored the game’s first 12 points before ending the first quarter up 17-15. During the first half, forward Ken Beaulieu and Jaleel Webb each dunked, much to the delight of their teammates on the bench.

At halftime Concordia had a 36-27 lead. The Golden Hawks scored 22 points in the third quarter, but it wasn’t enough to close the gap and overtake the Stingers lead. The Golden Hawks went on to only score 11 points in the final quarter.

Forward Ken Beaulieu led Concordia, and all scorers with 20 points, while his teammates Xander Jean and Jaleel Webb each scored 16 and 11 points respectively. Laurier was led by guard Will Coulthard, who scored 14 points in the loss, and forward Matt Chesson, who scored 12.

“I thought we played nice defensively,” said Stingers forward Xander Jean, who also registered nine rebounds in the win.

Laurier’s Golden Hawks fell to 0-2 at the Concordia Tournament with the loss. Their first loss was against UPEIUniversity of Prince Edward Island on Thursday evening, where the Golden Hawks allowed 101 points in a 101-93 loss.

“Every time we come out to Montreal, we have a pretty good game against Concordia,” said Laurier player Garrison Thomas. “I guess their effort was there and ours wasn’t and that’s what really did us in.”