Rhett Carter had 24 points in a comeback win (photo by Stella Cheng)
Rhett Carter had 24 points in a comeback win (photo by Stella Cheng)

CMS Men's Basketball Pulls Out Late Win at Redlands, Moves into Tie for First

REDLANDS, Calif. - Rhett Carter scored 24 points, Kiran Kruse had 22, and James Frye hit the go-ahead basket with 1:40 left as the 15th-ranked Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men's basketball team rallied after trailing the entire second half to take a huge 81-78 road win over previous SCIAC unbeaten Redlands on Wednesday evening.

With the win, CMS moves to 14-2 overall and 6-1 in the SCIAC, moving into a three-way to tie for first with Redlands, which falls to 12-4 overall and 6-1 in the league. Pomona-Pitzer, which visits CMS on Saturday in a first-place battle, also moved to 6-1 with a win over Caltech this evening. 

Redlands came into the game with a six-game win streak and looked poised to remain alone in first when it took an 11-point lead into halftime. The Stags kept battling back in the second half and the Bulldogs kept responding, until CMS was able to make its key move late. 

Trailing 75-69 with three minutes left, Josh Angle knocked down a big three-pointer off a Kruse assist to cut the deficit in half. After Redlands split two at the line, Kruse made a three-pointer off one of the nine assists from Brian Kenyon to make it a one-point game with 2:17 to play. 

After the Stags earned a stop, Kenyon found Frye for the go-ahead layup with just 1:40 to go, and Frye then pulled down a defensive rebound. Redlands missed the front end of a one-and-one with a chance to take the lead back, and with the shot clock winding, down Carter hit a key jumper with 22 seconds left to put CMS ahead 79-76. 

Redlands closed back to within a single point after a lay-up, but Angle hit two pressure foul shots with 10 seconds left, and Carter rebounded a tying three-point miss to seal the win for the Stags. 

Angle finished with 16 points, nine rebounds and four assists for CMS, while knocking down three of his four three-point attempts. Kenyon flirted with triple-double territory, finishing with nine points, seven rebounds, nine assists and only one turnover, continuing a remarkable senior season which sees him maintaining a 5.3-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio (107 assists, 20 turnovers). 

CMS will face Pomona-Pitzer in the first of two regular season matchups on Saturday with a share of first place on the line. The game will tip off at 4 p.m., after Pomona-Pitzer and CMS face each other in women's basketball in the first half of the doubleheader at 2 p.m.