LAKEWOOD, Colo. - Colorado State University Pueblo men's basketball held off a late-game rally here Thursday evening from Colorado Christian en route to posting a thrilling, hard-fought 56-54 victory over the Cougars in Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference action at the CCU Event Center. 

With the victory, the ThunderWolves extend their win streak to four straight games and improve to 17-7 overall and 11-5 in the RMAC, while Colorado Christian had their four-game win streak snapped as they fall to 11-12 overall and 6-9 in the league. The win allows the Pack to remain in sole possession of fourth place in the league standings with two weeks remaining in the regular season.

Redshirt junior forward Jaden Kennis (Windsor, Colo./MSU Denver) made back-to-back driving lay-ups in the final two minutes of the game, with the latter lay-up giving the Pack a 55-52 lead with 38.3 seconds left. Following Kennis' lay-up, the Cougars used a lay-up from Porter Bazil with 16 seconds left to cut the Pack's lead to 55-54. 

On the Pack's trip down court, Kennis turned the ball out of bounds with six seconds left, and on the play, Bazil was fouled and stepped to the line to shoot a 1-and-1 free throw. Bazil, who entered the game shooting 73 percent from the free-throw line, missed the front end of the 1-and-1, and junior guard Dylan Sanders (Aurora, Colo./Pearl River CC) collected the rebound and was fouled with 2.2 seconds left. Sanders would make 1-of-2 free throws to cap the scoring and seal the Pack's third straight win and its sixth road win of the season. 

Kennis finished the game with 11 points and six rebounds off the bench in the win, while Sanders led the Pack with a game-high 17 points for his third double-digit scoring effort, and sophomore guard/forward Jordan Blair (Keller, Texas/Keller Central) added 10 points in the win.

The Pack, who led 28-24 at the half, opened the second half on a 7-4 run to push in front 35-28 with 16:38 left in the game. After CCU scored five of the next seven points to cut the Pack's lead to 37-33 with 14:31 remaining, the ThunderWolves responded with a 14-5 run over the next seven minutes to extend their advantage to 13 points at 51-38. The run began with a lay-up from Blair and was capped by a Kennis lay-up with 7:52 remaining. 

Ironically, that lay-up by Kennis with 7:52 left would be the Pack's last field goal before Kennis' lay-up with 1:44 left, and in between those two baskets, CCU used a 13-0 run to tie the game at 51 following a driving lay-up by Schafer Reichart with 2:09 remaining in the game. 

Pierce Bazil, who missed two free throws in the final 15 seconds of the game to help seal the Pack's win, finished with 13 points and seven rebounds for CCU, while his brother, Porter Bazil, added 11 points, and Jared Lloyd, Jr., had nine points off the bench. 

In the opening half, the Pack never trailed, hitting four 3-pointers and holding CCU to a 1-for-7 effort from the perimeter, leading 28-24 at halftime. The Pack is now 15-3 this season when leading at the half. 

For the game, the Pack shot 44.4 percent from the field and was 7-for-21 (33.3 percent) from the 3-point line, including shooting 50 percent from the field and 37.5 percent from downtown in the second half. CCU shot 45.8 percent from the field and just 23.5 percent (4-for-17) from the 3-point line. 

The Pack was outrebounded, 27-24, as Kennis had a team-high six boards, and both teams finished with 11 turnovers, with CCU holding a 14-11 edge in points off turnovers. 

CSU Pueblo never trailed in the game and led for nearly 38 minutes and held a 20-16 advantage in bench scoring. 

The Pack was 9-for-14 (64.3 percent) at the free-throw line, and CCU was 6-for-9 (66.7 percent) from the line. 

The Pack will now take a week off from action before returning to action on Thursday, Feb. 19, with a 7:30 p.m. game in Denver against MSU Denver (7-16 overall, 5-10 RMAC). The Roadrunners, who plays at South Dakota Mines on Saturday, suffered an 84-77 road loss on Thursday at Chadron State.