DEERFIELD IL - A large crowd showed up for the rivalry game pitting TIU against St. Xavier.  The Trojans got big performances from Ignus Verbus (JR, Lithuania) and Patrick Atkins (JR, Chicago IL) but it wasn't enough to overcome the Cougars balanced attack.

The Trojans fell down early in front of a large TIU crowd as the Cougars opened the game on a 7-0 run.  Verbus would score first for the Trojans as he hit the first of his 21 points on a free throw attempt.  The lead would stay around six for the first 5 minutes of the game.  Then at the 15:37 mark the Cougars went on a 12-0 to put a comfortable distance between themselves and the Trojans and with 8 minutes remaining the Trojans found themselves down 30 points. 

The Trojans were far from finished however as they came firing back with a 10-2 run of their own to cut the lead to 22.  However, as TIU looked to cut the lead down into the teens the Trojans began to struggle to break the Cougar press committing 3 of their 23 turnovers in a 3 minute span.  At Halftime the Trojans Trailed 64-36.  

At halftime, Coach Euler lit a fire in his Trojan team as they came out and played inspired to start the second half.  The two teams went back and forth to start the half.  The Trojan defense picked up considerably keyed by Jason Frost (SO, Mannassas VA) who finished the game with 11 rebounds.  The Cougars who had shot 64% in the first half cooler down considerably scoring only 8 points through the first eight minutes of the second half.

The Trojans were unable to capitalize as cold shooting and turnovers defined the Trojans offense for most of the game.  Atkins was able to keep the Trojans offense afloat with his 24 points.  At the 10:17 mark the Cougars went on yet another run.  This one would put the Trojans away for good as the Cougars would go on a 9-0 run to increase the lead to 35.  The Trojans would cut the lead back to 28 on two occasions but that was as close as they would come falling 104-73. 

The Trojans next take on Indiana Wesleyan on the road  December 12th, at 2:00PM.