WEST POINT, N.Y. – Like most Army-Navy sporting competitions throughout the annals of the historic service academy rivalry, the men's basketball action on Saturday at Christl Arena was tight, physical and filled with gutsy hard-fought efforts throughout. Trailing by seven points with 3:25 remaining in the second half, the Mids (13-14, 7-9 PL) rode the hot-hand of Cam Davis (Jr., Battlefield, Mo.) down the stretch with 11 individual points to knot the game at 69-69 at the end of regulation before the host Black Knights (14-13, 9-7 PL) led the overtime period wire-to-wire on their way to the 86-75 victory before their home fans.
 
Davis led the Mids' offensive effort on Saturday with a career-high 28 points on 10-of-25 shooting from the field and a 5-of-7 showing at the foul line. Greg Summers (So., Ocoee, Fla.) played a large supporting role for Navy versus Army as he tied a career-high with 19 points and six rebounds in 43 minutes of action. John Carter Jr. (So., Spring Hill, Tenn.) finished with his second career double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds.
 
"I thought this was a great game," remarked head coach Ed DeChellis. "Obviously this is one that you don't want to lose, but I'm proud of my guys. We battled the entire game and gave ourselves the chance to win in regulation. We just didn't win. I don't have an answer for what happened in overtime; they ran a back cut on us one play, Funk made a few big shots and he just took the game over; that was the end of the day for us.
 
"A credit to him [Funk], I thought he would be really locked in as a senior. He hadn't won the Star Game in a few years and he wanted to go out by winning the Star at home. We told our team we were going to get his best effort and we did. He's a great player and he did a great job today. Again in saying all of the that, we gave ourselves a chance to win the game. We tried to take Matt Wilson out and play him a little differently and I thought we were pretty successful at keeping the ball out of his hands for the most part. If you told me he was only going to get 13, I would've told you that I'd be pretty happy and that we probably would have a chance to win; and we did."
 
The game opened with strong offensive performances on both sides with Davis serving as the catalyst for the Mids with six points in the first 2:46. Two more points from Summers helped Navy hold an early 8-5 lead. Alex King drew Army even at 16:13 with a three-pointer from the top of the arc. The teams continued the back-and-forth action with each squad netting baskets to make it 10-10 by the 15:34 mark. Navy was 5-7 from the floor during this opening run of action. The Mids eventually slowed down and the Black Knights took advantage to the tune of seven of the next nine points. Trailing 17-12, Carter scored five straight points to even the score at the 10:16 mark. In total, this was a part of nine consecutive points for Carter over a span of five and a half minutes.
 
Knotted at the halfway point of the first half, Navy received baskets from Tyler Nelson (Fr. Monroe, N.C.) and Summers to edge ahead 21-18 with 7:04 remaining. Over the next 2:45, Army ran off an streak of seven unanswered points to dart ahead 25-21 before Davis found his stroke from distance once again for the Mids with a pull-up three-pointer at 4:19. The host Black Knights took the momentum right back and turned a one-point lead, 25-24 into a 30-24 score. A five-point swing for Navy tightened the game right back up again. An Evan Wieck (Sr., Amarillo, Texas) jumper and an offensive rebound and follow-up three-pointer by Luke Loehr (Jr., Inver Grove Heights, Minn.) quickly made it a 30-29 contest. Army closed out the final 2:19 on a 5-0 run to take a 35-29 lead into the locker room.
 
For the first half, Army was outshooting Navy marginally, 44.0 percent (11-25) to 40.6 (13-32), though a 42.9 percent (6-14) mark from three-point range and a 77.8 percent clip (7-9) were significantly ahead of the Mids' 27.3 percent (3-11) and 0.0 percent (0-1) figures, respectively.
 
Leading by six, the Black Knights went up eight on its first possession before Davis answered back a minute later to make it 37-31 at 18:08. Over the next two minutes Army extended its lead into double figures, 43-33. A layup and and-one conversion by Summers at 15:53 and a fadeaway jumper by Carter at 14:59 got Navy right back into the game. One more Midshipmen basket, their third in a row helped shrink the visitor's deficit to just three points, 43-40. The game stayed at this score for the next two minutes until Army ended its 3:55 scoreless streak with a Josh Caldwell three-pointer. This was the first of three straight treys between the two squads as score quickly advanced to 49-43. The three-ball continued to be a weapon as Army's Tommy Funk hit his fifth trey of the day at 10:41 to increase the host's lead to 52-43.
 
Trailing by nine points with just over 10 minutes to play, Navy charged back with seven unanswered points over its next four possessions. Davis, Wieck and Summers all tallied points for the Mids as they fought back to make it 52-50. Navy's comeback continued with Summers converting an and-one the next time down the court to push the Mids ahead 53-52 at 7:52. Navy slowly stretched its lead out to two, 56-54 as the clock edged under five and a half minutes to play.

Seven straight points in 53 seconds from 5:15 to 4:22 help the Black Knights build up a five-point lead, 61-56. After another Army basket pushed its lead up to seven, Davis netted his 14th and 15th points of the game with deep jumper at 2:59. Less than a minute later, Davis dialed up from long distance with a three from the top of the arch to make it 63-61. Four straight foul shots for the Black Knights gave them a six-point lead with a 41 seconds left in the regulation. Davis continued to put the Mids on his back with another three-pointer, his third of the game 14 seconds later. Trailing by three, 69-66 and less than eight seconds to play, Navy raced up the court and ran multiple screens before Davis found himself with the ball and lining up for a three-pointer. At the last moment before releasing his shot, he was fouled by Army's Alex King with 3.7 seconds left. Davis calmly sank the first two of his three foul shots before watching his third attempt rim out. As the loose ball bounded about, Davis came down with his own offensive rebound and put up a shot only to get fouled again with 1.9 seconds left. The junior made one his two attempts to re-tie the game at 69-69 and force overtime.
 
"Our guys kept battling," said DeChellis. "We kept fighting and trying to win that next possession. It was a great play by Cam to come off the foul line grab the rebound and get fouled again; that's the fight you saw all day from us. The guys that were in the lane fighting to keep that ball alive on the miss deserve a lot of credit too. They did exactly what they were supposed to. They gave us a chance."
 
Navy's gutsy comeback in regulation seemingly had little effect on Army as the Black Knights won the overtime tip and immediately went up by three as King knocked down a three-pointer at the end of the shot clock. This was the beginning of a 9-0 start to the period by the Black Knights as they dashed ahead 78-69 by the 2:18 mark. Summers netted Navy's first two points of overtime on the ensuing possession. Unfortunately for the visitors this was one of their only two field goals of the period as they shot two for 12. Davis added two successful free throws in the period as Army outscored Navy, 17-6 in overtime on its way to the 86-75 win.
 
For the game, Army outshot Navy, 42.9 percent (24-56) to 37.8 (28-74) from the field and 42.3 percent (11-26) to 25.0 (6-24) from three-point range. While the Mids posted a higher free throw mark at 76.5 percent (13-17) to 62.8 (27-43), the Black Knights were able to take advantage of 26 more trips to the line and 14 more conversions.
 
"We just couldn't get to the free throw line today; we could not get there the way and the number of times that we wanted to," said DeChellis. "When you look at the stats that's the difference in the game."
 
Navy won the battle on the glass with nine more rebounds, 47-38. Loehr and Carter each tallied a team-high 11 caroms, including four on the offense end for Loehr.
 
Defensively, the Mids forced eight Black Knight turnovers and were credited with four steals.

Victories by Army's men's and women's basketball teams on Saturday helped the Black Knights keep the Mids from clinching the 2019-20 Army-Navy Star Series presented by USAA. Through 16 events, Navy leads 10-5-1.
 
Navy will begin its last week of Patriot League regular season action this Wednesday night with a home tilt versus Loyola. Following a brief senior day ceremony to recognize Evan Wieck, the Mids and Greyhounds will tip off at 7 p.m. at Alumni Hall.