RIPON, Wisconsin – The Ripon men's basketball program avenged an early-season loss and its worst shooting performance of the season as the Red Hawks eked out a 72-69 home win over Knox on Saturday afternoon for Senior Day.
 
Four players scored in double figures for Ripon (7-14, 5-7 MWC), who got 15 first-half points from Connor Spielvogel and a career-high 9 points from Ryan Davis. In a game where the biggest lead for either team was just eight, the Red Hawks led Knox (12-9, 5-7 MWC) for the entire second half and pulled within one game of the fourth and final seed for the upcoming Midwest Conference Tournament with four games remaining.
 
STANDOUT HAWKS

• Senior guard Connor Spielvogel had a team-high 15 points, all in the first half, on 4-of-8 shooting from deep. He added a career-high 7 rebounds.
• Sophomore forward Kolby Williams scored 13 points with 6 rebounds.
• Junior guard Luke Meinholz tallied 11 points, 11 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals for his third double-double of the season.
• Senior guard Clark Cunningham netted 11 points, 3 assists, 2 steals and 2 rebounds.
• Senior guard Ryan Davis had the aforementioned career-high 9 points on 4-of-5 shooting in 12 minutes of action off the bench.
• Senior guard Cade Tackmier also had 9 points, adding 3 boards.

PLAY-BY-PLAY
Spielvogel started the game by scoring the first six points and Ripon was off and running. With the Prairie Fire leading 18-12, Ripon ripped off 11 consecutive points to go up by five with under nine minutes left in the half. Knox countered slowly, going on a 12-2 run in the late stages of the half to lead 32-30. Spielvogel and Williams scored five of the last seven points of the half and Williams' layup with five seconds remaining gave the hosts a 35-34 advantage at intermission.
 
Following a critical 5-0 run within the first 10 minutes of the half, the Red Hawks held their largest lead of the stanza at 47-40 with 13:50 left and never trailed in the final 20 minutes. Knox would not go away and got within one on multiple occasions, but Ripon held firm. It was an uncomfortable half, however, as the Red Hawks never led by more than five in the final eight minutes of the game. Nursing a two-point lead, Davis hit a clutch jumper to put Ripon up four with under two minutes remaining. The Red Hawks scored their final five points at the charity stripe, withstood a desperation three by Knox at the buzzer and picked up the key conference win.
 
KEY STATS

• Both teams were 24-of-58 from the field, good for 41.4%.
• Ripon made the most of its free throws, going 17-of-22 (77.3%) while Knox only attempted 13 free throws and made 10 (76.9%).
• Each team had 26 points in the paint, but Ripon had statistical advantages in second-chance points (14-6), fast-break points (15-7) and bench points (35-23).
• Sean Gallery and Chikere Nwosu each had 17 points to lead Knox, while Grant Gessert chipped in 13 points off the bench.

UP NEXT
Ripon starts a two-game road trip at Cornell on Wednesday (February 7) at 5:30 p.m.
 
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