The Thompson Rivers University WolfPack men's basketball team have opened their final roadswing of 2019 with a victory. The Pack went into Edmonton and downed the hometown MacEwan Griffins 79-56.

TRU is now 5-1 on the year while the Griffins are winless in five starts.

TRU was up by five (17-12) after the first quarter and led 34-26 at the half.    The Pack outscored the Griffins 55-30 in the second half.

Thompson Rivers was led by Tyus DeVries (3^rd year, guard, Chilliwack, BC) with 19 points and two rebounds.   Joe Davis (5^th year, forward, Kamloops, BC) had 18 points, nine rebounds, three assists and a steal. Micheal Rouault (5^th year, guard, Vernon, BC) had 11 points and 12 rebounds along with two steals while Rojhe Colbert (3^rd year, forward, Phoenix, AZ) had eight points, six rebounds and two steals.

MacEwan was led by Abdullah Shittu with 14 points and a block.  Alex Jap had 11 points and nine rebounds.

HIGHLIGHTS:

https://youtu.be/oig08S8rpqw

The WolfPack outrebounded MacEwan 38-36 and had 44 points in the paint to MacEwan's 32.  TRU turned over the ball 13 times to the Griffins 18.   The Pack bench had 28 points to MacEwan's 15.
After the game, WolfPack head coach Scott Clark said, "It was a bit of a grinding game, grinding quarter. We were fortunate we made a couple jump shots. I thought our effort defensively was pretty good. We might have made a couple mental errors, but our physical effort was pretty good. There's things to be cleaned up mentally."

Clark praised his bench's ability to score, " Tyus comes off the bench and he can provide something. Brendan comes off the bench and provides us something and we've got some young kids who are coming along as well."

He adds with the injury to fifth year Kyrin Cybrenko (Saskatoon, SK), "It's a situation where everybody's going to need their bench at times whether it's because of injury or because of foul trouble. Today we experienced some foul trouble and I thought Sullivan was pretty good coming off the bench and Brendan as well. Those guys have really stepped up this year compared to what they were last year. That gives us a big boost with those guys coming off the bench."
 
The two teams will play again Saturday (Nov 16) in Edmonton before the Pack return home to close the pre-Christmas portion of their season with weekends against UNBC (Nov 22-23) and Saskatchewan (29-30)

With assistance from MacEwan Sports Information)