Despite making their first five shots and pulling ahead to an 11-point lead just six minutes into the game, the Big Red faded late amid an 86-70 road loss to the Toledo Rockets.
Matt Morgan led the way for Cornell (5-6) with 24 points, connecting on two three-pointers and hitting all 10 of his free throws. Josh Warren had another solid night, finishing with 14 points on a 6-for-9 clip, while adding seven rebounds, six assists and two blocks. Jimmy Boeheim had eight points and two rebounds, and seven players for Cornell ranged between three and seven points on the night.
Cornell came out firing on all cylinders, hitting its first five shots, three from Morgan. The Big Red were up 13-5 at the first media timeout, and then up 19-8 minutes later. Then Toledo (11-2) went on a mega-run and took its first lead at 26-25 with 7:30 to go. Cornell found itself down 48-39 at the break but started the second half quickly thanks to a three from Morgan. Despite being in striking range for most of the second half, the Big Red just couldn’t string together enough stops to get closer than six down and finally ran out of steam with about seven minutes to go. Remember that the tilt with Toledo was Cornell’s third game in four days.