Box Score Poor shooting hampered the Wabash basketball team Monday night in a 61-37 home loss to Rose-Hulman. The defeat came just two days after the Little Giants battled eight-ranked Illinois Wesleyan to a six-point loss.

“First off, the ball was not going into the hole,” Coach Antoine Carpenter said of his team's offensive woes. “We just weren't moving with good energy and making hard cuts.”

View photos from the game here.

Wabash only shot 35.7% for the game. The team is very young and sporadic play is often a growing pain, but players are taking the loss as a learning experience.

“The fact of the matter is we're a young team and this was our fourth game playing together,” junior captain Pete Nicksic said. “The game was not a letdown; it was learning experience.”

The Fightin' Engineers only held a one-point lead at half time, but they came out of the locker room and hit on 4-of-5 three-point attempts to expand the lead they wouldn't relinquish. James Pillischafske connected on three straight jumpers beyond the arc in the short span after half time. He was 4 of 8 from downtown and led all scorers with 14 points.

“When you play a zone, at some point they're going to get a decent look at a three-point shot,” Carpenter said. “But I don't think this loss was due to a lack of defensive effort. If you told me somebody would score 61 every game, I'd take it.”

The second-half deficit ballooned from that point. A 13-0 run over a four-minute span late in the second half sealed the Little Giants' fate.

“The shots weren't falling that typically do,” Nicksic said. “The shooting percentage for our team was pretty atypical. We stress shot selection and getting the better shot over the good shot.”

Nicksic logged a 7-point and 7-rebound effort for the night. Freshman forward Daniel Purvlicis led Wabash in scoring with 8 points on 4 of 9 shooting. Sophomore Kasey Oetting added 6 points while junior Andy Walsh and freshman Austin Burton each scored 5.

“It's going to be a situation with our young guys where we play well one game but have to do it again against someone else,” Carpenter said. “Shots went in against Illinois Wesleyan. The problem with this team is the experience. When shots are not going in, how do you get a bucket? How do you get to the rim? How do you get the ball inside to score? These are some things the team still has to learn.”

The Little Giants will have the rest of the week to answer these questions. Their next game is will be Saturday in Chadwick Court when Wabash opens North Coast Athletic Conference play against Denison University. Tip off will be 3:00 p.m.