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Los Angeles, CA — Oxy's men's basketball team looked to continue their strong start to the season as they traveled to Orange to face the Chapman Panthers on the road. The game was the first game of the SCIAC season for both teams. 

Chapman started out the game by scoring twice to take a 4-0 lead before Oxy's Andrew Waldman responded with a 7-0 run of his own. Henry Wilson then added to Oxy's lead with two made free throws and the score was 9-4 in Oxy's favor. 

It was a very close game for much of the 1st half as both teams were playing strong defense and forcing difficult shots for the opposing offenses. Jacob Koretz was able to create some good looks at the basket with the help of his teammates and made jumpers on back to back possessions for Oxy. 

Oxy's lead awas 14-12 after those baskets but Chapman responded with back to back 3-pointers and a made free throw and quickly took a 19-14 lead over Oxy. Nicky Clotfelter responded with a made layup to stop the run by the Panthers and Koretz followed with another made jumper of his own. 

Oxy toko the lead back on an Andrew Waldman made jumper before the half would close with Oxy up by one point in a 22-21 game. Chapman came out hot in the 2nd half with back to back made 3-pointers again. The Panthers went on a 8-0 run to take a 32-24 lead before Jacob Koretz stopped the momentum with a layup plus the foul to get a chance at a 3-point play. Koretz converted the free throw to make the score 32-27 Panthers. 

Henry Wilson drew a foul and converted one of two at the line before Koretz got free in the paint on the next play and converted a layup for the Tigers to complete a quick 6-0 run for Oxy. The teams began trading baskets as the game approached the halfway mark of the 2nd half when Waldman put the Tigers back up 1 with a layup to make the score 35-34 Tigers. 

The made layup by Waldman was a part of an 11-0 run on offense by Oxy that was capped off by a Jacob Hamermesh layup to give Oxy a 7 point lead after being down 4. As the game reached 8 minutes of play left Chapman got the lead down to 4 with a made layup. Waldman responded with a made jumper in the paint but Chapman came down and cashed in a 3 on the next possession. 

With 5:52 remaining the score was 47-45 Tigers before Henry Wilson made a jumper in the paint and Waldman drew a foul to get to the line and knocked down both free throws. An Oxy foul on the next possession sent a Panther to the stripe where they knocked down one of two. Nicky Clotfelter had a layup on the other end after the free throws and the Oxy lead was back up to 7 with 3:54 remaining. 

Chapman came up with a big 3-pointer at the 2 minute mark to cut the lead down to 4. After Oxy missed a jumper to try to respond the Tigers forced a turnover and Jacob Koretz converted a layup off of it to get the lead to 6 points again. 

Oxy came up with a huge stop and forced a missed 3-pointer by Chapman with 57 seconds remaining in the game. The Tigers would be fouled and sent to the line for the rest of the game where they would cash in all of their free throw attempts to secure a win in the the first SCIAC game of the year. 

Andrew Waldman led the way for Oxy with 25 points and 7 rebounds. Jacob Koretz also had a great game on the offensive end with 19 points. Nicky Clotfelter was a presence on the glass in this one as he grabbed 12 boards and also scored 12 points to secure a double-double. 

Oxy will look to continue their great play to start the season when they take on the Whittier College Poets on Saturday, December 2nd at 2pm in Rush Gym in Eagle Rock.