KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Missouri S&T's men's basketball team was able to overcome a slow offensive stretch to begin Monday afternoon's game with Lincoln at the MIAA Men's Basketball Challenge at Municipal Auditorium, but a second one late in the contest proved costly as the Miners dropped a 71-63 decision to the Blue Tigers.

The Miners (2-2) made just one field goal in the first 10 minutes of Monday's game and fell behind by as many as 13 points as a result, but on the back of CJ Hedgepeth (Evansville, IN/Harrison), went on a 13-0 run to tie the score at 20 at the 6:22 mark on two free throws by Jordan Newt (San Francisco, CA/Malibu).

Hedgepeth scored the Miners' first 10 points of the game and had 14 of his 18 first half points in the first 14 minutes of the opening 20 minutes of play. 

After Newt's free throws tied the score, the Miners took the lead a short time later on a lay-in by Romain Louiserre (La Ferte Alais, France/Fredrick Fays) and went back-and-forth with the Blue Tigers (3-2) for the rest of the first half, eventually going to the locker room with a 31-28 lead following a basket by Juwan Miller (Kitchener, Ont./Huron Heights) just before the halftime buzzer sounded.

S&T made just two of its first 14 shots, but made seven of its final 14 in the opening half to gain the advantage at the intermission.

The Miners quickly extended that lead to seven in the early moments of the second half, going up 39-32 after a basket by Jordan Newt (San Francisco, CA/Malibu) nearly two minutes into the period.    However, Lincoln scored nine straight points to take the lead back before S&T got baskets from Nikola Andric (Uzice, Serbia/Gymnasium) and Miller to get the score back in its favor.

Lincoln regained the lead at 45-44 before S&T went on a 9-2 burst – beginning when Yahmir Muhammad (Rockford, IL/Auburn) hit the team's first three-pointer of the afternoon – to take a six-point lead with seven minutes to play.  The Miners held a four-point lead after a driving lay-in by Ervin Sarajlic (St. Louis, MO/Oakville) with 5:39 to play, but Lincoln scored the next seven points and took the lead for good on two Terrance Smith free throws  with 4:42 remaining.

The Miners made just two field goals in a stretch of over four and one-half minutes following the Sarajlic lay-up.

Hedgepeth led all scorers in the game with 25 points and Louiserre added 10, but the Miners made just 35.4 percent of their shots in the game and only two-of-12 from three-point range.

Lincoln shot 52 percent in the second half and 41.5 percent in the game, with Smith leading the way with 24 points and 10 rebounds.  Smith had 15 of his 24 points in the final 20 minutes.

The Miners will return to game action Friday when they face Upper Iowa (1-2) at the  Doubletree/Houlihan's Classic at Drury University in Springfield.  Friday's game starts at 1 p.m., as will Saturday's contest against Newman in that event.