St. Joseph, Mo. - Jason Adams scored a career-high 34 points and hit a career-best six three pointers, but the Missouri Southern basketball team couldn't pull out a big road win tonight, falling 89-84 at Missouri Western.

Southern (7-4, 1-3 MIAA) has found it hard to win in St. Joseph through the years and now falls to just 7-32 at Western overall. Adams led three Lions in double-figures with his career night, scoring 34 points on 12-21 shooting from the field, 6-11 from long range and 4-4 from the charity stripe. He added seven rebounds, three assists and a block.

Mariun Price scored 12 points on 4-8 shooting from the field and 3-4 from long range, while Keane Thomann added ten of his own with seven rebounds. Skyler Bowlin and Patrick Hester had nine points each, while DaRell Crittendon scored eight. Bowlin had a game-high nine assists

Western (9-3, 4-1 MIAA) overcame an early first-half deficit to cut the Southern lead to just one at the half.

The Lions started the game strong, but a three from the Griffons' Marcus Jones tied the game at ten, five minutes into the game. However, over the next seven minutes, Southern pushed its lead to 14 (33-19) after four straight threes, two from Crittendon, and one each from Price and Adams, as well as a baseline jumper from Thoman.

Western responded to the early push by the Lions, and the Griffons went on a 19-6 run to end the half, including scoring the final eight points and cut the Lions' lead to 39-38 at the break.

Soutehrn led by four (63-59) after a free-throw from Bowlin with 9:17 left in the second half. Western re-took the lead and led by three, before a trey from Price with 6:18 left gave the Lions a 70-69 lead, the last Southern would have of the night.

The Lions came into the game having made only 6-44 (.136) threes in MIAA play, but drained 15 tonight as a team. They shot 48 percent from the field and 57 percent from long range. Bench points were even at 31 apiece and Southern out-rebounded the Griffons 39-33.

Southern will be back in action this Saturday when the Lions travel to Pittsburg State to take on the Gorillas in a 7:30 pm tip off at John Lance Arena. The game will be part of the Sonic Trophy Series, which pits the two athletic departments in an overall point contest.