Box Score The curtain went up on the 2017-18 Canada West men's basketball season Friday night (Oct 27). The Thompson Rivers University WolfPack opened up a weekend series facing the MacEwan University Griffins out of Edmonton, Alberta. The WolfPack held a nine point lead at the half and went onto down the visiting Griffins 80-61 on the Warner Rentals court at the Tournament Capital Centre It was the first meeting between the teams in nearly two years. SYNOPSIS Both teams had a lot of fresh faces in their lineup and both used a lot of players: everyone dressed saw action. The WolfPack were led by TRU Bookstore/McDonalds "Leader of the Pack" Luke Morris (5th year, forward, Mission, BC). He had 29 points and six rebounds in 33 minutes of floor time. Derek Rhodes (4th year, forward, Anticoch, CA) added 13 points and 4 defensive rebounds in 28 minutes. MacEwan's top gunners were Dustin Gatzki (2nd year, wing, Westlock, AB) with 12 points and six rebounds in 25 minutes. Adonis Monfort-Paolomino (3rd year, guard, Calgary, AB) had 9 points in 30 minutes of court time. VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS: right here KEY STATS: Thompson Rivers : Luke Morris (5th year, forward, Mission, BC): 29 points Derek Rhodes (4th year, forward, Antioch, CA): 13 points Joe Davis (3rd year forward, Kamloops,BC) : 10 points Mike Rouault (3rd year, guard, Vernon, BC) 12 points 12 rebounds MacEwan: Dustin Gatzki (2nd year,wing, Westlock, AB) 12 points 6 rebounds Adonis Monfort-Palomino (3rd year, guard, Calgary, AB) 9 points Atlas St. Paul-Butler (3rd year, forward, Victoria, BC) 8 points 6 rebounds Ali Raza: (3rd year, wing, Calgary, AB) 8 points and 3 rebounds Turnovers: MacEwan: 14 TRU: 16 Score by Periods: TRU 18 21 26 15 -80 MacEwan: 16 14 18 13 -61 RECORD: TRU: 1-0 MacEwan: 0-1 QUOTES: TRU head coach Scott Clark (fifth season): On the Contest: " I thought we executed our game plan relatively well. Guys made some shots and we were a little tougher defensively and the score was in our favor. That is great. But there is a game to be played tomorrow and we have to get ready for that." On turnovers :"Even still, I thought there was some sloppy ball handling decisions and stepping out of bounds. You can cut that down to 12 turnovers. We would like to keep it less than 15. We had 16. You have to tighten that up." On everyone getting playing time: " It was good that everyone got to play today. They get rewarded a bit for coming to practice. It's good for everybody to have to support everybody. That is the nature of being part of a team." Video of post game interview: here MacEwan Head Coach Eric Magdanz (sixth season): On the game: " It is a learning curve for us. I thought we did some good things tonight. There is a lot of execution that was lacking. If we can clean those things up it will make a big difference." What did he like about his squad: " We had some guys who came off the bench and played hard and were aggressive. They did some things we wanted to do. It is just really cleaning up some of the smaller details." Video of post game interview: here UP NEXT: The WolfPack and Griffins will do battle again tomorrow (Saturday) night at the Tournament Capital Centre starting at 7 pm. The game will be webcast on www.Canadawest.tv with Jamie Shinkewski calling the play by play. Kendric Carlock will be the color commentator and Kashara Atkins providing interviews. The pregame show begins at 6:50 pm.