The Hillsdale College men's basketball team had an accurate shooting eye Saturday afternoon, from both the free throw line and the 3-point arc.
In the team's 85-74 win over Ashland University Saturday afternoon, Hillsdale set a single-game school record for 3-point field goal percentage, making eight of its 10 attempts from that part of the court. The 10 3-point field goal attempts were a season-low for the team, but it made the most of its attempts.
Hillsdale is now 12-4 overall, 8-4 in the GLIAC and winners of 10 of its last 11 with the win. The team concludes its three-game homestand next Thursday by hosting Malone University at 8 p.m.
While the team attempted its fewest number of 3-pointers in a game this season, the Chargers set a season-high with 39 free throw attempts, cashing in on 31 of them, good for a .795 percentage. Thirty-five of those attempts came in the second half, and leading the parade to the line was senior guard Brandon Pritzl, who played with his usual cool in leading the team to the win.
Pritzl set career-highs with 14 makes on 16 free throw attempts, leading all scorers with 23 points in the game. He played 36 tough minutes and had 4 assists and 3 rebounds. He also drained all three of his 3-point attempts.
Senior forward Tim Dezelski was somewhat hampered with foul trouble, and played a season-low 25 minutes. But he was his usual impactful self, finishing with 14 points, 11 rebounds and 3 assists. He sat out 15 minutes of Saturday's game. By comparison, he sat a grand total of 9 minutes in the previous 5 games.
Five players scored in double figures for Hillsdale, suing terrific balance to help offset Dezelski's minutes.
Sophomore forward Kyle Cooper looked back at full strength, and made 7 of his 9 shots, finishing with 16 points in 28 minutes. Senior Anthony Manno popped in 11 points, matching Pritzl by going 3-for-3 from 3-point land.
Hillsdale's accurate shooting kept the Eagles to just 21 total rebounds in the game. The Chargers shot 69.7 percent from the floor, hitting 23 of their 33 shots from the field.