SPRINGFIELD, Mo.— Senior Riley Naeger was on his game Saturday afternoon, posting a perfect shooting day in helping the Drury Panthers to an 89-72 win over the Missouri S&T Miners at the O'Reilly Family Event Center, completing a three-game sweep of their current home stand.
 
Naeger was 8 of 8 shooting from the field, including 2 of 2 from three-point range and 5 of 5 from the free throw line, finishing with a season-best 23 points and pacing the Panthers in a solid second half performance that saw them improve to 10-5 overall and 3-4 in Great Lakes Valley Conference action.
 
"Riley was a guy that was here when I got here and he's been such a special guy," said Drury head coach Chris Foster.  "He's so much about the team and you always love to see guys like that rewarded with some success."
 
After trailing the Miners 42-40 at the half, Drury broke out of a back-and-forth battle to grab a five-point lead with ten minutes to play, then extended the margin to a high of thirteen points with three minutes remaining and waltzed home with the win.
 
"It's really about our depth," added Foster.  "Without Eli (Whitley) and Juok (Riak) we needed some guys to step up and we've just got to rely on that down the stretch.  It was just a great team effort"
 
While Naeger's performance was stellar, sophomore Logan Applegate again stole the scoring honors.  Two days after a 29-point effort against Marvyille, Applegate put 27 on the board to top the Panthers.  Junior Brock Wakefield after opening the game with back-to-back three-point makes, finished with 13.
 
The Miners who dropped to 9-5 and 3-4 with the loss were paced in scoring by Okenna Okeke, who closed with 23 points.
 
The Panthers hit the road for their next action and will play at Upper Iowa, Thursday, January 18th at 7:45 pm.
 
 
#allweDUiswin