Battle returns, Garcia's OT winner leads Gophers over Cal Baptist

Jamison Battle returned after missing the first four games with a foot injury and Dawson Garcia's jumper with five seconds remaining helped the Minnesota Golden Gophers claim a 62-61 overtime victory over Cal Baptist in the SoCal Challenge in San Juan Capistrano, Cali. on Monday night.

Battle's return was expected to spark the Gophers' offense but the sophomore struggled in his first game of the season. Battle shot just 4-for-15 from the field and 1-for-8 from 3-point range despite finishing with 11 points on the night.

The Gophers' didn't seem phased by Battle's struggles early, opening the game on a 15-0 run. While the Lancers made things close, Minnesota was able to go into halftime with a 26-18 lead and ran the lead up to as many as 14 points in the second half.

Cal Baptist made its move with just under 10 minutes remaining in the second half, going on a 12-3 run to tie the game at 48. The Gophers ran the lead back up to 53-48 on a Braeden Carrington free throw with 1:55 to go but a layup from Hunter Goodrick and a 3-pointer from Taran Armstrong eventually sent the game to overtime.

The Lancers took their first lead of the game on a Joe Quintana layup with 4:16 remaining in overtime and took a 61-58 lead on Quintana's jumper with 1:25 to go. After Pharrel Payne's dunk with 58 seconds remaining, the Gophers forced a stop and found Garcia on the block for the game-winning bucket.