CMS Men's Basketball Suffers First Loss, Drops David Wells Classic Opener to Whitworth

CLAREMONT, Calif. - The Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men's basketball team suffered its first defeat of the young 2021-22 season when it dropped a 71-53 decision to Whitworth on the first day of the annual David Wells Classic at Roberts Pavilion.

Senior forward TJ Askew had a career-high 15 points for CMS, which drops to 2-1 overall on the young season, while Whitworth improves to 4-1 with the win. 

A Josh Angle three-pointer made the score 12-9 Whitworth early on, but the Pirates used a 20-6 run to take a 32-15 lead and forced the Stags to play from behind the rest of the way.

CMS earned a bit of momentum at the end of the half when Askew caught an alley-oop off an inbounds pass from Angle with one second left, converting a three-point play and cutting the Whitworth lead to 45-29 at the break. The Stags then started the second half with a mini-run and closed the lead down to 47-37 after an Askew lay-up off a feed from Matt Meredith, forcing a Whitworth timeout. 

The Pirates withstood the counterpunch, though, and answered back with a 7-0 run to push the lead back up to 54-37. The Stags weren't able to sustain a run after that as Whitworth was able to control the game down the stretch for the win. 

Angle finished with 12 points for the Stags, while senior Luke Webb had a solid effort, shooting 3-3 from the floor with three blocked shots in 10 minutes of playing time. JT McDermott led all scorers for Whitworth with 18 points. 

CMS will be back in action tomorrow to take on Linfield on the second day of the David Wells Classic. Linfield suffered its first loss as well, dropping an overtime game to Pomona-Pitzer in the first game of the men's doubleheader.