Dominant second half give Pride 84-69 win over Hastings
SEWARD, Neb. - Hitting the road for another classic style weekend, the Clarke University men's basketball team picked up their second win of the season in an 84-69 neutral court victory over Hastings College at the Cattle Classic hosted by Concordia University in Seward, Neb. on Friday night.
Highlighted by an outstanding 53-35 advantage in the second half, the Pride played a game that was told in three stories, a strong start, sluggish, middle and outstanding finish to pull out their first win over an NAIA foe in 2025-26.
CU's strong start was a 15-0 opening five minutes of action before the Broncos got their first points of the game as Nick Bryant got the scoring started, Carson Lindauer hit a three, then DeMarco Clayton scored eight-straight points before an Ivan Vukusic layup gave Clarke the 15-0 lead all before the first media timeout of the game.
That would be the Pride's best stretch of scoring in the first half as they would go on to score 16 points over the remaining 15 minutes where Hastings would outscore Clarke 34-16 over the remainder of the half to lead at the break by three points.
In that opening half, outside of Clayton's 15 points on 4-for-6 (66.7%) shooting from the field, the rest of the Pride went 6-for-20 (30%) with no one making more than one shot with CU also committing eight turnovers in the opening 20 minutes compared to just four from HC.
Hastings would maintain their lead coming out of the halftime break, until a Vukusic jumper and Desmond Jones three pointer gave Clarke their first lead since the 6:11 mark of the first half at 13:19 remaining in the game.
Those two buckets would start a 15-2 run for CU behind another Jones three, a Clayton jumper, a Bryce Luster three, and a Jonovan Howard layup through a foul to take a 45-41 Broncos lead to a 56-47 Pride advantage that they wouldn't relinquish for the rest of the game.
In the second half, the Pride only missed nine of their 28 shots from the field for a 67.9 percent mark while going 8-of-11 (72.7%) from deep and 7-for-10 (70%) from the free throw line as the difference from beyond the arc and free throws giving CU a 20-point advantage in the period where they outscored the Broncos by 18.
Jones has established himself as a key contributor to the Clarke offense through five games, scoring in double figures in four of those five games and getting thrust into the starting lineup in the last two for back-to-back 16-point games where he would go 6-for-8 (75%) from the field and 4-for-5 (80%) from deep while finishing a rebound shy of his first career double-double with a game-high nine rebounds.
Clayton finished 4-for-5 (80%) from three point range as well to post a game-high 27 points with a stat-stuffing six rebounds, two assists, and three steals along with a perfect 7-for-7 game from the free throw line and four makes from two-point range for an 8-for-12 (66.7%) shooting game from the field.
Lindauer was the third and last member of the Pride lineup in double figures as he scored 10 points and added four rebounds, an assist, and a block, while Vukusic finished with six, Bryant added five, then everyone off the bench produced at least two points with Howard at six, Luster at five, Jackson Graham hitting a three, then Joe Brown, Brian Madden, and Michael Kascel all scoring two points each.
Clarke men's basketball will be back on the court of Friedrich Arena for a true road game part of the Cattle Classic against Concordia University on Saturday for a 2:00 p.m. CT scheduled tip between the Pride and Bulldogs on Nov. 8.