In front of a loud and excited fan base, the Biola men’s basketball team won against the San Diego Christian Hawks in their first Golden State Athletic Conference match of the season. Both times these two teams met last season, Biola lost by a score of 73-70. The Eagles avenged themselves tonight by winning 61-58, incidentally the same margin they lost by both times last year. This propels them into double-digit win territory with an overall record of 10-1.

Both teams had plenty of rest coming into the match, with Biola’s last game six days earlier and SDCU’s three. Additionally, with the history of these two teams last season, the crowd expected a good game. It proved a thriller when Biola led by 18 points at two different times, the game ending with a three-point gap. SDCU fought hard the entire game, never conceding to the Eagles' home-field advantage.

Both teams had a solid first half, with neither team leading by more than five points. Biola took that lead to the locker room at half-time, as sophomore guard Dakari Archer got robbed of a three-pointer as time expired. The ball rolled around the rim once, then fell out, eliciting a collective groan from the crowd. Archer would end up the second-leading scorer in the match with 15 points, trailing only his teammate, senior guard Pierre Zook, who ended the night with 17.

The second half proved exciting, as Biola came out on fire and expanded their lead to 18. Two of the most exciting plays during that run came in the form of dunks, one by freshman forward Steve Herve and the other by senior forward Mike Kurtz off of an alley-oop pass from Zook. The latter of the two actually made the lead 18 points with 14:42 left on the clock, at which point SDCU started to fight back. The Hawks slowly ate away at the Eagles' lead, eventually tying the score at 58 with 1:42 left. Biola would not relinquish the lead, barely holding off the Hawks' push to take the win by three points.

Biola’s next game is at William Jessup University on Saturday, Dec. 6 at 7 pm.