LAKELAND, Fla. – Eckerd College posted 28 points off of 18 West Alabama turnovers to edge out the Tigers 82-78 in the final day of the Sunshine State/Gulf South Conference Challenge Sunday.

Eckerd begins its season 1-1, while West Alabama falls to 0-2. The Tigers combined to shoot 28-for-49 (57.1 percent) from the field and 9-for-13 (69.2 percent) from the 3-point arc. The Tritons finished 29-for-60 (48.3 percent).  

"We did feel a lot better about our performance tonight," said UWA Head Men's Basketball Coach Allen Sharpe.

"We still have to improve at guarding. We gave up 93 points last night and 82 today. We feel like we are scoring enough points to win, but we have to get better at defending. We were much more spirited and team oriented today. Even though we lost we still made some progress."

Jerrick Stevenson led the turnover battle, making six of the Triton's 13 total steals. He finished with 20 points, shooting 6-for-15.

Five Tigers tallied double-digit scoring marks, led by Kenric McCants with 19 points. Justin Wright totaled 16, followed by Lleon Tillman with 15 and Jarell Byrd with 12. Charles Eaton came out of reserves to account for all of UWA's 11 bench points.

McCants finished with seven assits and two steals and combined with Byrd to shoot 6-for-6 3-point field goals. West Alabama led the 30-27 in total rebounds with Tillman posting eight. Eckerd

UWA was 15-for-25 (60 percent) from the field and 4-for-4 from the 3-point line in the first half. The Tigers took a 15-4 point run in the final seven minutes, but Eckerd battled back to take a 37-35 lead at the break, shooting 14-for-28 (50 percent).

The round robin challenge concludes the first two of six straight road tests for West Alabama. The Tigers move on to the GCI Alaska Invitational in Fairbanks, Alaska Nov. 20-22, opening the tournament against Minnesota State University Moorhead on Thursday at 5 p.m.