Gambier, Ohio — The Oberlin College men's basketball team held off the young Kenyon College Lords for a 66-57 North Coast Athletic Conference victory on Wednesday night. 

Senior Eli Silverman-Lloyd led the Yeomen with nine of his 11 points coming in the second half, finishing the night 3-of-7 from three-point land. Junior Charles Tiedemann chipped in 10, while Christian Fioretti finished with nine. The Yeomen had five bench players score more than two points a piece for a total of 28 points from the reserves. The strong bench play was led by Jordan Armstrong who cashed in eight to go with his team-high 10 rebounds. 

After some back and fourth play in the early minutes, the Yeomen pulled away with an 18-3 run  capped by a Wolf Moser layup to make it 32-17 with 4:28 left in the first half. The Lords scored seven of the final 11 points in the rest of the half to cut the Yeomen lead to 12, 34-22, at the intermission. Oberlin shot an impressive 51.6 percent (16-of-31) in the opening half, with 18 of its points coming off the bench.

Kenyon scored the first five points in the second half highlighted by an old fashion three-point play  by Christian Watanabe which cut the Yeomen lead to 36-29 at the 19:04 mark. Five minutes later, Silverman-Lloyd knocked down one of his threes to put Oberlin back up by double figures, 44-33. 

Some careless turnovers by Oberlin opened the door for the Lords, who went on a 8-0 run to make it a one score game, 44-41, at the 10:49 mark. The Yeomen answered with an 8-0 response run to put themselves back up by 11 with eight minutes left. 

The Lords would not back down and battled back within two scores with 6:18 left.  In the final minutes, the Yeomen tightened up on the defense end, allowing them to extend their lead back out 11 on a dunk through the lane by Armstrong with less than two and a half minutes left. 

Kenyon worked its way within two scores several times down the stretch, but the deficit forced the Lords to foul. Oberlin missed just one free throw in the final minute of play to seal the victory.

Oberlin finished the night shooting 44.6 percent (25-of-56) from the field, but only knocked down six of its 20 tries from beyond the arc. The Yeomen won the battle of the boards 42-32, with both teams grabbing 10 offensive rebounds. Kenyon scored 16 points off of Oberlin turnovers in the contest, but only shot 34.4 percent (21-of-61) overall and 23.5 percent from three.  

Oberlin heads back to campus with a 6-5 conference mark and 10-8 on the season, while Kenyon falls to 1-17 overall and are winless in NCAC action. 

The Yeomen will be back at home for a crucial NCAC match-up on Saturday versus DePauw University. The opening tip is set for 3 p.m. in Philips Gymnasium.