ANCASTER, Ont. - The Sheridan Bruins men's basketball team (14-2, 8-1 OCAA) saw their 12-game unbeaten streak come to an end, falling behind Redeemer late in the first quarter and being unable to claw back in a 96-78 loss.
"I thought we played poorly in stretches and Redeemer took full advantage," head coach Jim Flack said. "I'm proud of our effort and our semester. Now, we know what we have to work on."
It was a sluggish start for both sides, but especially the Bruins who connected on just four of 23 field goals in the first quarter. Despite that, they actually managed to hold a slim 12-9 lead until a 12-0 Redeemer run over the final 1:57 gave the homeside a 21-12 lead after one.
The Double-Blue chipped away and twice clawed back in the second frame, pulling within four less than three minutes in and then pulling level, 36-36, with 84 seconds to play.
Once again though, Redeemer was able to put together an unanswered run, this time 8-0, to take a 44-36 advantage into halftime.
The third quarter is where things really fell apart for the Bruins, as they scored only five points over the first five and a half minutes, while Redeemer ran the margin to 19.
In the first minute of the fourth quarter, Sheridan had nearly sliced their deficit in half, trimming the margin to 11 - 71-60 - but that would be as close as they would get.
The Bruins shot just 28.4 per cent from the floor (25-88) and 57.6 per cent from the charity stripe (19-33) while Redeemer 44 per cent and 78.6 per cent respectively.
Three Bruins were in double figures, led by Nick Campbell (14), and followed by John Avery (11), and Jemol Edwards (11).
Blue notes: The loss snapped more than just the 12-game win streak the Bruins had going, but also brought to an end a streak where they had won 40 straight against OCAA competition, and 32 straight in OCAA West regular season play. The 40-game OCAA win streak is one of the most dominant stretches in Sheridan basketball history, as the Bruins out-scored their opposition by an average of 24.9 points per game (102.7 for Sheridan, 77.8 for their opponents). Twenty times during the streak the Bruins scored at least 100 points, while their opponents scored 80+ only 11 times. In total, they went 635 days without losing to an OCAA opponent.
Their last regular season loss also came at the hands of Redeemer, falling 88-85 on Jan. 12, 2016. Sheridan now leads the all-time series against Redeemer 18-4, but the two sides have split the last eight meetings, and the Bruins are just 8-4 against Redeemer since the arrival of Royals' head coach Jamie Girolametto in 2012.