APPLETON, Wis. — Bryant Ackerman came off the bench to score 29 points and lead the Elmhurst College men’s basketball team to a 96-81 nonconference victory over Lawrence University on Saturday at Alexander Gymnasium.
Kyle Wuest added 25 points, and Nick Sanford had a double-double with 13 points and 11 rebounds for the Bluejays (2-2).
Chris Siebert scored 26 points to lead Lawrence (1-2) and became the 21st player in school history to top the 1,000-point plateau. Siebert now has 1,019 points in his career and moved past Rob Cohen (1,005) into 20th place on the career scoring list.
Lawrence made several runs at the Bluejays in the second half, but Elmhurst was deadly from long-range after the break. The Bluejays went 6-for-8 from beyond the arc in the second half and hit 52.4 percent (11-21) for the game.
Ackerman went 10-for-15 from the floor, including 7-for-10 from 3-point range.
The Vikings trailed by 10 at the half and were still down by that margin after a 3-pointer from Ackerman with 14:19 left. Lawrence then reeled off eight consecutive points, six coming on back-to-back 3-pointers from Siebert, to cut the margin to 58-56 with 12:47 left.
The Bluejays answered with a conventional three-point play from Wuest, five consecutive points from Ackerman and a layup from Will Nixon to push the lead back to 68-58.
After a Wuest free throw moved the lead to 72-59 with 9:19 left, Lawrence made another run. Troy Miller drilled a 3-pointer and Trace Sonnleitner followed with another 3-pointer to cut the margin to 72-65 with 8:13 left.
Sanford then hit a jumper and Ackerman made another 3-pointer to answer for the Bluejays. Sonnleitner, who finished with 12 points and five rebounds, buried another 3-pointer for Lawrence, but Elmhurst scored the next five points to push the margin back to 82-68.
Lawrence didn’t get closer than 10 points the rest of the way.
The Vikings do not return to action until Dec. 4 when they open Midwest Conference play by hosting Carroll University.