Lake Forest Drops Home Finale to St. Norbert

Photo by Sydney Gardner
Photo by Sydney Gardner

Freshman guard Sean Espinosa tied for team-high honors with 14 points in the Forester men's basketball team's 78-68 loss to St. Norbert College at home on Tuesday.

Espinosa shot 6-for-10 from the field and had his point total matched by sophomore guard Aram Arslanian, who scored seven points in each half. Junior guard Jordan Moran led the home team with six rebounds and senior guard Eric Porter with three assists and three steals in his final career home game.

Lake Forest shot just 40.3 percent from the floor while the Green Knights connected on 55.1 percent of their field goal attempts, including 11 of 19 from three-point range. The visitors also had a 36-30 edge in rebounds but committed 15 turnovers to the Foresters' five. After reaching double figures in turnovers in each of its first 17 games this season, Lake Forest has only done so once in the last seven and is averaging just seven during that span.

The home team led by as many as five points in the first half before a 15-1 St. Norbert run gave the Knights a nine-point advantage. The teams went into the locker room at halftime with the visitors ahead by seven at 36-29.

The Foresters closed to within four points early in the second half, fell behind by 11, and then trimmed the margin back down to three on a pair of free throws by Espinosa with 4:06 on the clock. After making just one of five free throws in the game's first 36 minutes, the Green Knights knocked down 12 of 14 down the stretch to secure the victory.

Lake Forest is now 16-8 overall this season and 12-5 in Midwest Conference play. St. Norbert improved to 18-6 overall and 13-4 in the league.

The Foresters will close out the regular season at Lawrence University Saturday afternoon at 1:00.