Brescia holds off late Rio rally, upsets RedStorm

Rio Grande Sports Information
     OWENSBORO, Ky. - For the first time since the start of the 2024-25 season, the University of Rio Grande men's basketball team now finds itself dealing with a losing streak.
     The 25th-ranked RedStorm mounted a furious rally and sliced a 17-point second half deficit down to one in the waning seconds, but host Brescia University held on for a 79-76 upset victory, Saturday afternoon, in River States Conference action at The Moore Center.
     Rio Grande suffered a second straight loss for the first time this season, falling to 13-5 overall and 4-2 in league play.
     The Bearcats ran their season mark to 5-9 overall and 3-3 in the RSC.
     Brescia led from start to finish, bolting to a 7-2 lead out of the gate and leading by as many as 16 points late in the half before settling on a 36-24 advantage at the intermission.
     The Bearcats opened the second half on a 7-2 run as well and grabbed what proved to be their largest lead of the contest, 43-26, after a three-point goal by Linking Lockhart with 17:53 left to play.
     Rio Grande did manage to close the gap to 49-43 following a layup by junior Keylane Lasisi (Paris, France) with 13:09 remaining, but the deficit ballooned to 15 points again, 71-56, following a steal and subsequent layup by Brescia's Damian Garcia - the conference's leading scorer - with 5:19 left.
     The RedStorm still found themselves staring at a double-digit deficit inside the final 90 seconds, but continued to chip away and drew to within 77-76 after a three-pointer by sophomore Aiden Porter (Proctorville, OH) with 18 seconds remaining.
     Garcia was fouled immediately and drained a pair of free throws with 17.1 seconds left to push the Bearcats' lead to 79-76 and set up a gut-wrenching finish.
     Rio Grande junior Trey Robertson (Waverly, OH) missed a would-be game-tying three-pointer with six seconds left and, after the RedStorm rebounded a missed free throw attempt by Brescia's John Saenz with 3.4 seconds, Porter came up short on his would-be game-tying trifecta as time expired.
     Lockhart led the Bearcats' winning effort with 24 points - more than double his season average of 11.2 points per game - 18 of which came on six three-point goals. All but one of his three-pointers came in the second half.
     Garcia had 23 points of his own to go along with seven rebounds, while Saenz and Carrieun Mathis also had seven rebounds. Mathis had a team-best five assists.
     Brescia shot 45.5 percent overall (30-for-66), including 50 percent in the second half (16-for-32), and was 8-for-21 from distance (38.1%).
     The Bearcats also enjoyed a 38-37 edge in rebounding.
     Rio Grande shot just over 61 percent in the second half after shooting 28.6 percent in the opening stanza and finished the game at 43.9 percent (29-for-66).
     The RedStorm, who went 0-for-26 from three-point range in a loss at Indiana University on Tuesday, hit just one of their 11 attempts from beyond the arc in the first half before going 7-for-15 from distance after the break.
     Robertson led Rio with 18 points and six assists, while redshirt junior Jaelin Johnson (Fairmont, WV) had 17 points, senior Eythan House (Montrose, Australia) netted 15 points and senior Eric Butler (Orlando, FL) tallied 10 points and eight rebounds.
     Rio Grande is scheduled to return to action on Thursday night when it hosts Indiana University Southeast in RSC play at the Newt Oliver Arena. Tipoff is set for 5:30 p.m.