SHEPHERDSTOWN, W.Va. (Dec. 8) - The Cardinals were knocked off 81-74 at Shepherd Saturday afternoon in a Mountain East Conference (MEC) game at the Butcher Center.

The Wheeling Jesuit University men's basketball team falls to 0-9 overall, 0-6 in the MEC. Meanwhile, the Rams improve to 3-3 in league play, 6-3 overall this season.

Sophomore guard Brendan Hoban (Watertown, Mass./Millbrook School) led the Cardinals with 24 points on 9-of-19 shooting, including six three pointers. The freshman trio of guards Jay Gentry (Milwaukee, Wisc./Brown Deer), Franck Kamgain (Kansas City, Mo./DME Sports Academy) and Steve Cannady (Bowie, Md./St. Vincent Palotti) all scored in double figures with 13, 12 and 11 points, respectively.

Shepherd led 14-13 with 12:52 left in the first half. The Cardinals went on a 7-2 run, capped off by a Kamgain basket-and-one, to open up a 20-16 advantage with 11:17 remaining in the period. Both squads traded the lead and the contest went back-and-forth down the stretch of the first half, before the Rams managed to take a 36-33 lead into halftime.

Consecutive layups by Kamgain to start the second half put Wheeling Jesuit back in front less than 30 seconds into the second half at 37-36. The Cardinals took its largest lead of the second half, 47-44, on a second-chance basket by Hoban with 14:43 remaining in the game.

Sophomore guard Zach Collins (South Riding, Va./Freedom) knocked down a three-point shot to give WJU its final lead of the night at 52-51 with 11:38 left on the clock. Shepherd answered with a 12-1 spurt to open up a 63-53 advantage with 8:15 remaining in the contest. Wheeling Jesuit got back within six, 77-71, after a Hoban trey in the final minute of the game, but the Rams managed to hold off the Cardinals to pick up the win.

Despite only shooting 3-of-18 (17 percent) from long range, Shepherd still managed to post a respectable 29 of 54 (54 percent) performance from the field. The Rams were led by Winston Burgess's game-high 29 points.

The Cardinals will take a break from its MEC schedule when it heads to Greensburg, Pennsylvania on Tuesday, December 11 to take on Seton Hill for a non-conference game at 6 p.m.