Box score  | Season stats | Thanksgiving Classic

BOLIVAR, Mo. -- The #8 SBU Bearcats ended day one of the SBU Thanksgiving Classic with a resounding 117-77 victory over the Henderson State Reddies. Five Bearcats scored in double figures led by Matt Rogers with 36 points. Eleven different players scored for the Bearcats.

"It's nice to play everybody," said head coach Jeff Guiot. "They work hard and its nice to get them some playing time. They did good, though its hard to tell how good, but they played well.

Rogers had 29 in the first half and looked to be on his way to breaking the all-time SBU mark of 40 points held by Glenn Stanley and Tim Elliott. "Matt shot extremely well and could have broken the record, but we aren't about stats," said Guiot. "Hopefully he gets 40 in a game where we need him to."

Rogers also missed his career high by a point while tying his career high with 13 field goals. He finished with 36 points on 13 of 15 shooting, including five of six from long range. He also had six blocks and four rebounds. Tristan Steele had 20 points, Thijin Moses had 17, Tim Baines added 12 and newcomer Ivan Cropotov had a career high 10 points. SBU shot 59% from the field for the game and were 19 of 36 (53%) from three-point range.

Guiot added that his Bearcats (6-1) are still trying to put two halves together. "We work to build habits and it is hard to to buy into that, but we're working on it."

The Bearcats raced out of the gates to a 10-0 lead and quickly extended that to 21-4 by the first media timeout. SBU led at halftime 60-36 after leading by as much as 31 points in the first half. The Bearcats' largest margin in the second half was 43 points with two minutes left.

Lance Smith led the Reddies (2-3) with 27 points while Kyle Oldham had 19.

The win extended the Bearcats' dominance at home, with their home court streak now standing at 32 games, the second longest active streak in Division II.

The Bearcats will rematch with Dallas Baptist on Saturday night at 6 p.m. SBU topped the Patriots in Dallas last weekend by a final of 102-84. Henderson State will play Emporia State tomorrow at 2 p.m.