Wyoming, MI – The Grace men's basketball team welcomed another talented NAIA opponent in Trinity Christian College to the Aldrich Athletic Center this past weekend. Despite playing 37 minutes of quality basketball and holding the lead for the majority of the game against the Trolls, the Tigers would finish the game empty on their final six possesions (0-5 FG, 1 turnover) and the Trolls escaped with a 76-70 win.

Cole Powell led Grace with a career-high 18 points on 7-10 shooting. Parker Neu and Thomas Hill added 13 and 10, respectively. Kellum Bridgeforth dished out 10 assists. Jarius Shumpert pulled down a season-high 13 rebounds as the Tigers outrebounded the Trolls 40-28 as a team.

"I am really happy with the way the team is playing," commented Grace Head Coach Gary Bailey. "We are finally getting into a groove where we are playing good Grace basketball. We still need to fix our ability to manage a lead. Today we had trouble extending our lead and let Trinity back in. They took advantage of our mistakes late. This is something we will work on."

The Tigers followed up with an exhibition game against Saginaw Valley State University Sunday night – a team that defeated NCAA DI Western Michigan University by 17 points earlier this season. They would hang tight with the Cardinals and only had a single-digit deficit for the majority of the game, but in the end fell 89-67.

After a holiday hiatus, next up for the Tigers are two big games on their home floor against local opponents – Cornerstone University on December 28^th and Aquinas College on the 29^th.