The Carleton Ravens men’s basketball team continued their winning streak with two road games Nov. 8-9, defeating the Lakehead University Thunderwolves and Guelph University Gryphons.
With the two victories, the Ravens have won their first four games of the regular season.
The first game against the Thunderwolves was tight early on, but after they settled in, the Ravens took care of business to build up a 20-point lead at halftime.
The Thunderwolves never recovered from that deficit and lost 92-50.
Philip Scrubb led the Ravens with 15 points.
“I think we played pretty well defensively,” Scrubb said. “We shot the ball well, and overall it was a great game for us.”
The Ravens defeated the Thunderwolves in last season’s Canadian Interuniversity Sport (CIS) men’s basketball Final 8 gold medal game to take the crown.
“They’re usually well-coached,” Carleton second-year guard Connor Wood said. “We knew they were going to come out and bring their best.”
After winning the silver medal in the CIS men’s basketball Final 8 last season, the Thunderwolves started the season not ranked in the CIS top 10.
“They’ve lost a lot of guys since last year, but they played pretty tough,” Scrubb said. “They’re young, but I think in the future they’ll be pretty good.”
The Ravens’ second game of the weekend was against the Gryphons Nov. 9.
The Ravens led the Gryphons by 12 points at the end of the first quarter and they did not look back from there.
The Ravens controlled the ball well and maximized on scoring chances. Once again, Philip Scrubb led the team with 25 points, and his brother Thomas had 16 rebounds.
Coming off the bench, Wood had eight points against the Thunderwolves and five points against the Gryphons.
“I feel like Guelph shot the ball really well. We did a lot better defending against Lakehead than against Guelph,” he said.
Taylor Boers and Zachary Angus each had strong offensive games for Guelph, racking up 17 and 15 points respectively.
The Ravens won the game 97-69. Carleton improves to 4-0 on the season and remains first overall in the CIS rankings. Guelph remains winless at 0-4.
Despite their success, Scrubb said the team should still be striving to improve down the road.
“We definitely still have a lot to work on. In practice we’re going to focus on playing with more passion and playing more for each other,” he said.
Carleton goes on the road again to play the McMaster University Marauders Nov. 15, and then the Brock University Badgers Nov. 16.
