NEW ORLEANS, La. – The Talladega College men's basketball team suffered its first GCAC loss tonight on the road during a 68-60 setback at Southern University of New Orleans. This is the second straight loss for the first time this season for Talladega. The Tornadoes fell to 16-3 and 6-1 in the conference while SUNO improved to 6-17 overall and 6-6 in the GCAC.

SUNO took an early 4-0 lead to start the game, but Talladega came back as it used a 7-2 run to take a 7-6 lead with Lamont Sams hitting a jumper at 16:06 to put the team ahead.  Both teams went back and forth for most of the half with neither gaining no more than a four-point lead until the 1:57 mark. Up by three, Talladega's D'Andre Boyd's jumper pushed the lead to 28-23. The largest lead of the half for either team. SUNO chipped away at the lead but couldn't gain much ground as the Tornadoes held on to a 35-29 lead going into halftime.

Coming out of halftime, SUNO cut the Talladega lead down to three to trail, 37-34.  Each team continued to go back and for like they did in the first half to find themselves tied at 47 with a little over 11 minutes left in the game.  Tied at 49 now, SUNO was able to take a 53-51 lead on Talladega and hold them off to go on to win 68-60.

The contest saw six lead changes and was tied five times.

Corey Sands paced with 13 points to lead Talladega while going 5-of-12 from the field and 3-of-7 from the arc.  Teammate JaVonni Bickham finished with 12 points with four of them coming from the line.

Sams tallied 10 points for Talladega while grabbing a team-high seven boards.

Talladega is back in action tomorrow night when it travels to face GCAC foe Dillard University at 7 p.m.