Box Score BOX SCORE

The High Point University men's basketball team took its first lead of the game with under five minutes to play but eventually lost to Liberty, 66-60, on Thursday night at the Millis Center in High Point, N.C. Junior Nick Barbour led all scorers with 21 points, including 17 in the second half.

"We missed some key opportunities," said HPU head coach Scott Cherry. "We had a couple good looks at threes that we missed and there were some transition opportunities and we missed layups. The kids played their hearts out, I'm proud of the way they played. Now we're looking forward to Saturday and coming out to play a good VMI team."

High Point fell to 5-10 overall and 2-5 in the Big South while Liberty improved to 12-7 overall and 6-1 in league play.

Behind Barbour, Shay Shine scored 14 points and Corey Law scored 10 for the Panthers. Liberty was led by John Brown's 14 points and 10 rebounds. Jesse Sanders scored 13 points and grabbed six rebounds and David Minaya scored 12 with seven boards.

Liberty got out to a 20-11 lead in the first 10 minutes capped by a dunk from Brown before the Panthers scored seven straight to get back within two. After Liberty hit two baskets to get back out front by six, Tehran Cox hit a trey to make it 24-21. Liberty scored eight of the final 12 points of the first half to take a 32-25 lead into the break. The Panthers had a chance to get within four in the last minute when Barbour hit a basket and drew a foul, but he missed the free throw and Liberty's Sanders hit two free throws with 1.8 seconds left on the clock.

It took nearly two minutes for the first basket of the second half to be scored, a layup by HPU's Law. Liberty countered when Joel Vander Pol redirected an inbounds pass from Sanders to make it 34-27. Liberty was up by six at the first media timeout until Barbour hit a trey and Du'Vaughn Maxwell drained two free throws to make it 34-33.

The teams traded baskets for the next several minutes in the low-scoring affair before Barbour drew a three-shot foul. He drained all three free throws to tie the score at 40-40 for the first time since the start of the game. Neither team scored on their next three possessions spanning over two minutes until Liberty's Vander Pol and Brown hit baskets to make it 44-40. HPU's Shine followed with a three to get the Panthers back within a point.

Maxwell got HPU its first lead of the game (47-46) with 4:37 left when he tipped in his own shot but Liberty was able to score, get a stop and score again to take a 50-47 lead. Barbour countered for the Panthers with his second three-pointer of the game to tie it at 50-50 with 3:30 left in the game. Liberty's Brown scored the next three baskets to get the Flames back out to a six-point cushion before a two-and-one play by Barbour got it to 56-53. The Panthers wouldn't get any closer after Liberty's Evan Gordon followed it up with his own two-and-one to propel the Flames to the six-point victory.

The Panthers are back in action on Saturday when they host VMI at the Millis Center at 7 p.m. The game will be televised live on WCWG and on the Big South Network.