SOU-Simpson Boxscore 

The Southern Oregon men's basketball team turned the ball over 21 times and Simpson University scored its first win of the season with a 90-87 victory tonight at McNeal Pavilion in the first day of the Flagship Inn Classic.

Simpson is now 1-6 on the season. Southern Oregon fell to 2-4 overall. In the opening game of the night, top-ranked Oregon Tech took down The Masters College 81-63. Saturday night, Oregon Tech faces Simpson at 5:30 p.m. and Southern Oregon hosts The Masters College at 7:30 p.m.

Eli Thornton (Victorville, Calif./Victorville) led SOU with a game-high 21 points. Austin Wolfer (Woodburn, Ore./Woodburn) had 14 points, while Kory Mahr finished with 12 points and 10 rebounds, Jarrad Childs (Paso Robles, Calif./Paso Robles) had 11 points and Humphrey Jackson (Redwood City, Calif./Woodside) had 10.

Justin Sparks led Simpson with 20 points, including a 10-for-12 effort from the free throw line.

Despite the turnovers, the Raiders made it a game late in the second half after Simpson had pushed the lead to 81-65 with 8:14 to play.

Thornton got the SOU fans involved with a dunk to cut the lead to 81-71 with 4:27 to play. A three-point by Mahr capped a 14-0 run to make the score 81-79 with 2:49 left in the game.

Simpson responded by going 9-for-10 from the free throw line to give themselves a 90-81 lead with 10 seconds left, but it still wasn't over.

A Jackson 3-pointer and a turnover and another Jackson 3-pointer had the lead down to 90-87 with five seconds to play.

The Raiders then forced another turnover and Jackson couldn't get the final 3-pointer off before time expired.

SOU shot 55 percent for the game and limited Simpson to 40 percent shooting.