By David Boyce, Northwest Athletics

ST. CHARLES, Mo. – The first nine three-pointers Northwest Missouri State men’s basketball team fired up were blanks. And when the Bearcats drove inside, Lindenwood’s 7-foot-1 center Stanislas Heili was there to block or alter the shot. Heili finished with seven blocks.

That combination spelled doom for Northwest Sunday afternoon at Hyland Arena. The Bearcats dropped their second straight MIAA game, falling 68-52 to Lindenwood.

“With this team right now, we don’t have a lot of hunger,” Northwest coach Ben McCollum said. “We beat Southern at Southern. We beat Central at Central, and then you get that sense of accomplishment when you don’t realize it is a 22-game (conference) season.

“Everybody that plays us, it is there biggest game. They are going to hit shots they might not normally make.”

Northwest heads into Christmas break with a 6-4 record overall and 4-2 in the MIAA. Lindenwood, improving to 8-3 overall, moves in front of the Bearcats in conference with a 4-1 record.

The game at Lindenwood concluded a tough stretch for Northwest to start play in the MIAA. The Bearcats played five of their first six conference games on the road.

“I don’t think it was much of a factor,” McCollum said. “It has more to do with our mental toughness. We are not mentally tough now.”

It is hard to blame road weariness on the double-digit loss. Lindenwood played well offensively and defensively.

Northwest trailed by seven points at halftime and never found a spark in the second half. Lindenwood opened the second half scoring five straight points for a 36-24 lead. The Bearcats were chasing the rest of the way.

For a brief moment, it looked like the Bearcats were ready to make that run to catch the Lions. Junior Zach Schneider nailed Northwest’s first three-pointer to make it 36-27. A couple of minutes later, sophomore Justin Pitts made Northwest’s second straight three-pointer, helping the Bearcats close to 40-33.

Northwest, though, never found an offensive rhythm and that hurt since Lindenwood senior Cory Arentsen was making three-pointers, free throws and 15-foot jumpers.

The fall-away, 15-foot jumper by Arentsen to make it 56-39 proved that it was simply Lindenwood’s day. Arentsen finished with 23 points and Heili added 12 for the Lions, who shot 64 percent from the field for the game. In the second half, the Lions went 13 for 18 for 72.2 percent.

“We didn’t guard a lot of people and we didn’t score,” McCollum said.

Pitts was the only player to have offensive success for Northwest. He finished with 25, but as a team, Northwest shot 33.9 percent and was four for 19 beyond the arc for 21 percent.

“I haven’t been able to get it out of this group,” McCollum said. “I will have to look in the mirror and figure out why that is and what I am doing wrong and got to fix it.”

The first half was almost as dismal for Northwest.

In a very strange half of runs, Northwest was on the bad end of one late in the first half and went into halftime trailing 31-24.

The Bearcats started slow and fell behind 9-4. But a little after the first media timeout, Northwest started to click on offense and built a 20-13 lead.

Seemingly in control, the Bearcats went ice cold the last 5 minutes and Lindenwood got hot. The Lions concluded the first half on an 18-4 run.

One nice thing that did occur for Northwest was the public address announcer mentioning that Northwest won the NCAA Division II football title on Saturday.

On the basketball court, few things went right for the Bearcats except for one stretch midway in the first half.