The No. 23 ranked Emory University men's basketball team lost on the road to No. 19 ranked WashU, 85-81, Friday night in St. Louis, Missouri.

Sophomore Ben Pearce went for a season-high 26 points to go along with five assists and tied a career high with nine rebounds as the Eagles suffered their second straight UAA road defeat to fall to 9-4 overall and 0-2 in the UAA. The Bears were led by three players in double figures with Kyle Beedon posting a team-high 20 points as the team improved to 11-2 and 1-1 in conference play.

Junior Logan Shanahan and sophomore Jair Knight joined Pearce in double figures with 15 and 12 points, respectively. Knight added a game-high 10 rebounds while Shanahan matched Pearce with nine boards. Freshman AJ Harris had 10 points as well with classmate Ethan Fauss notching nine points and five rebounds in his homecoming to St. Louis.

After Emory scored the first basket of the game with a Knight layup at the 18:37 mark, the Bears controlled play in the first half – leading the rest of the way and were in front by as many 11 points at 36-25 before the Eagles ended the half on a 7-0 run to trail 36-32 at the break.

Emory seized its first lead since the opening bucket as Knight completed an and-one opportunity to put the Eagles ahead 40-38 at the 17:50 mark in the second. However, the Bears answered on the other end with a Beedon three, one of his six three pointers in the contest, leading to a 10-0 WashU run. Harris snapped the stretch with a three of his own to make it 48-43 but the Bears put together another run, scoring eight straight to move in front 56-43 with 13:00 to play.

The Eagles cut the deficit to nine points on three different occasions before finally making their push within the final 90 seconds of play. A 7-0 run highlighted by a Pearce layup and a corner three from Harris made it a four-point game at 83-79 with 1:07 remaining. The Emory defense held on the next possession out of a timeout, forcing WashU to turn the ball over with a shot clock violation.

Pearce had two chances on the other end to make it a one-score game but could not convert at the rim, leading WashU to sink free throws to clinch the win.

The Eagles shot 41.7% from the floor and outrebounded the Bears 44-43 but turned the ball over 20 times which led to 23 WashU points.

Emory looks to snap its two-game skid as its three-game UAA road swing concludes on Sunday, January 14 with a meeting against the UChicago Maroons. Tipoff from Chicago is scheduled for 1:00 PM EST.