Lacey, WA – After breaking the century mark for the eleventh time in the 2014-15 season, the Simon Fraser University men's basketball team have improved on their best season in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference with a 103-87 victory over Saint Martin's Thursday night.

"This was a great team effort," said head coach James Blake. "We played very hard in our press and turned them over to get easy points."

The Clan's starting lineup of Sango Niang, Justin Cole, Michael Harper, Roderick Evans-Taylor and Patrick Simon combined for 82 points in the win, led by 23 points from Cole.

The senior was 8-of-13 from the floor and 3-of-6 from beyond the arc, while fellow guard Niang put up 15 points and 12 assists for a huge double-double performance.

Niang was only three rebounds away from making it a triple-double, pulling down seven defensive rebounds on the night.

The Clan opened the scoring with a lay-in from Evans-Taylor, but quickly fell flat as the Saints jumped to a 21-8 lead seven minutes into the game.

After working their way back to a one-point deficit at 24-23, Adam Westfall came off the bench to sink his first of the game, a three-pointer to give the Clan a 26-24 lead.

The teams continued to trade-points before SFU finally found its groove, taking a 12-1 run to close the half, leading 49-38 at the mid-way buzzer.

In the second half the Clan led without contention, the Saint's challenging to within five points only once, as the visitors cruised to a 103-87 victory.

Simon put up 17 points for SFU while Evans-Taylor and Harper added 14 and 13 respectively, helping the Clan shoot 52.8 percent from the floor during the contest.

"I am really proud of our effort tonight," Blake continued. "This is not an easy system to play for an entire season, but they have been able to press everyone in the conference and make our opponents play our style."

With the win the Clan improve to 6-10 in GNAC play, and 11-13 overall. This mark's the program's best season in the GNAC, and with two games remaining in regular season play, and opportunity to close the year with a .500 win-loss record.

The Clan will face two tough opponents to close the season, first travelling to Monmouth, OR to take on the Western Oregon Wolves, before visiting Bellingham's Western Washington Vikings in the final game of the regular season.

Tip off against the Wolves will be 4:00 p.m. on Saturday, February 21, while the border battle with the Vikings will start at 7:00 p.m. on Thursday February 26.

As the season comes to an end, Simon Fraser would like to take note of the program's three graduating seniors; Sango Niang, Justin Cole and Daniel Deflorimonte.

Tonight, watch our feature on Sango and his time with SFU, and be sure to check back following the final two games to watch Justin and Daniel as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsuW_kLwv9M