The Emory men's basketball almost pulled off a rally from a nine-point deficit late in the second half, but fell short in its comeback bid Friday evening, dropping a tough decision at No. 20 Washington University.  The Eagles saw their overall record slip to 14-6,  6-4 in the University Athletic Association, after falling by a 68-65 count to the Bears who boosted their overall effort to 17-4, 7-3 in the conference.

Trailing by a 52-45 margin with 8:34 left in the contest, four points by sophomore Josh Schattie and a bucket by junior Jake Davis drew the Eagles to within 52-5 with 6:42 left in the game.   However, the Bears countered with a 10-2 charge, with six points coming by Nick Burt, to surge to a 62-53 bulge with 4:09 on the clock.  Michael Freidberg accounted for five points in a subsequent 6-0 Emory counterattack that sliced the gap to three points with 2:18 on the clock.  A layup by WU's Ben Hoerner pushed the home team's lead back to six points with 1:14 left but a clutch triple from the corner by  McPherson Moore kept the Eagles within striking distance.  A free throw by WU with 45 ticks on the clock boosted its lead to 68-63 but Emory's Alex Greven answered with a layup with 37 seconds to keep the deficit at three points.  On the Bears' ensuing possession, sophomore Michael Florin came up with a steal that gave Emory an opportunity to force the game into overtime.  However, a triple try in the waning seconds just missed its mark and ended the Eagles' comeback bid.

Moore paced the Emory scoring attack for the fourth time this year with 15 points, hitting five-of-12 from the floor along with all four of his free throw opportunities that extended his school-record streak to 43 straight makes at the stripe.    Friedberg rounded out the team's double-figure scorers with 12 points while snatching a squad-best 10 rebounds, his third double-double of the campaign.  Sophomore Josh Schattie gave Emory a big boost off the bench with nine points, hitting all three of his field goal attempts as well as all three of his free throw tries.

For the game, Emory shot 35.8 percent (24-of-67) from the floor while WU checked in at 47.3 percent (26-of-55).   The Eagles were successful on just 30 percent (6-of-20) of their three-point attempts and were outrebounded by a 45-33 margin.  Emory came up with a season-high 18 steals, tying the sixth highest team total in school annals, and forced 23 Bear turnovers that it parlayed into 23 points.   Leading WU in scoring was Alan Aboona with 16 points.

Emory led for most of the first half and used eight points from Moore and five points each by Schattie and Greven to take a 31-30 lead into the intermission.   The Eagles saw six different players score in an early 12-2 run en route to a 16-8 lead which they extended to 11 points, 23-12, following a runner by Greven with 8:15 left in the stanza.  Emory repeatedly stymied the WU offensive attack during the opening 12 minutes with numerous deflections that helped generate 11 turnovers.    Emory still maintained a nine-point margin at 28-19 with 5:21 on the clock following a bucket by Moore, but the host squad closed out the stanza with an 11-3 blitz, the last five points coming from Kevin Bischoff, to cut the Emory edge to one point.   Wash U closed out the opening 20 minutes of play by hitting 50 percent from the floor (12-of-24) compared to Emory's 35.1 percent effort (13-of-37).   Emory did account for 12 points off 14 Bear turnovers while losing possession on five occasions.

Emory returns to action on Sunday (Feb. 10) when it plays at the University of Chicago.