Thirty points from the Charger bench helped the Briar Cliff men's basketball team take down Hastings 71-61 Saturday in the Newman Flanagan Center. BC improves to 12-12 on the season and 9-10 in the GPAC.
 
"It's good to get back in the win column today," said head coach Mark Svagera. "The guys really executed defensively throughout the game."
 
Hastings jumped out to an early 13-4 lead seven minutes into the game. The Chargers got a boost from the bench as Ethan Freidel and Andrew Gibb scored eight straight points to bring the Cliff within one point 13-12. Hastings held BC scoreless for nearly seven minutes, going on a 9-0 run to take a 26-21 lead with 2:09 remaining in the half.
 
Gibb and Freidel led BC at the intermission with nine points and seven points, respectively as the Cliff trailed 25-27. BC was just 2-for-18 from deep in the first 20 minutes, while Hastings was 2-of-10 from the 3-point line.
 
"In the first half I thought we were a step slow and that caused us to settle for a lot of tough shots," said Svagera. "We settled in in the second half and got things working a little bit."
 
BC outscored Hastings 14-6 over the first five minutes of the second half to take a 39-33 lead. The Chargers extended their lead to as much as 14 points with 4:45 remaining after Conner Groves third 3-pointer of the second half. After a rough first half the Charger offense knocked down 7-of-16 treys and shot 57.7 percent from the field.
 
Gibb and Groves both scored 16 points to lead the Chargers. Gibb finished 7-of-10 from the floor and grabbed seven rebounds, while Groves grabbed a team high eight boards. Wil Johnson put together a solid 19 minutes off the bench dishing out five assists and tallying three rebounds. Quinn Vesey added 14 points, four rebounds, and four steals.
 
Briar Cliff held the edge with 32 points in the paint compared to 18 for Hastings. The Broncos got to the free throw line more often going 16-for-18 from the charity stripe while BC converted 10 of their 13 free throw attempts. The Charger bench outscored Hastings bench 30-0.
 
"I was really happy with the production from our bench today. I thought Andrew Gibb, Ethan Freidel and Wil Johnson were probably the difference in the game for us," noted Svagera. "It was great to get a win today, especially going into a situation with two weeks off."
 
Mason Hiemstra led all players with 24 points going 7-for-21 from the field and 9-of-10 from the free throw line. Karson Gansebom added 17 points and Dashawn Walker chipped in 12 points.
 
Briar Cliff will have a couple weeks off before hosting Dordt on February 20 for Senior Day in the Newman Flanagan Center.