MARIETTA, Ga. – The Loyola University New Orleans men's basketball team just keeps winning. Saturday's 91-85 win over Life University not only marked a 5-0 start to the season and a 2-0 start to Southern States Athletic Conference play, but it also extended the NAIA's longest winning streak of 26 straight victories for the program. 
 

Loyola doesn't have much time for rest either, as the team will now travel to Panama City, Florida, for the Battle at the Beach tournament Monday through Wednesday. First up for the Pack is Mid-American Christian at 6 p.m. on Monday. 
 

The first half of Saturday's contest at Life featured extremely close play, as the lead changed five times with seven ties. In fact, neither team could hold a lead larger than five, and both teams played with a lead for at least five of the 20 first-half minutes. 
 

Milan Mejia, Jalen Galloway and Michael Harden scored the first six points for Loyola, 6-2, and Zach Muller helped bring the game to an 8-8 tie four minutes into the matchup. After a scoreless two minutes, Life took an 11-8 advantage over the Pack, but Harden's second made shot tied the game once again, 11-11, with more than 12 minutes left in the half. Leonard Jackson put Loyola ahead with a 3-pointer shortly after, but like the theme of the game, Life nodded the score at 15-all. 
 

There was another tie at 18-18, but Mejia powered a quick 7-0 run with two 3-pointers, then Galloway and Matthew Mondesir each scored to put the Pack ahead 26-23 with six-plus to play. The Running Eagles used an 8-0 of their own to take their biggest lead of the game, 33-28, but two made shots by Blake Burkey and four points from Galloway brought the score to 37-35 by halftime. 
 

Loyola started the second half red-hot with a 16-4 run to take a 10-point lead four minutes into the period. After Harden converted an old-fashioned 3-point play to start things, Burkey hit a 3 and a 2-point field goal to keep things going in the Wolf Pack's favor. Mejia got into double figures scoring with consecutive made shots, 53-43, then a dunk by Mondesir and another score by Galloway made it a 57-49 Loyola advantage with more than 14 minutes left in the game. 
 

After Life briefly made it a 7-point game, 59-52, Loyola extended its lead back out to double digits four more times before the Running Eagles made things interesting late in the game. Holding an 81-66 lead with 5:40 on the clock, Loyola saw its lead get trimmed down to three, 83-80, over the next three-plus minutes of game time. Galloway made two clutch free throws, 85-80, and Mondesir made a big-time 3-pointer, 88-82, in the final minute to preserve the lead, then another score by Mondesir secured the win.

Pack Facts

• Jalen Galloway continues to put up big numbers for the Wolf Pack this season. With his fourth double-double in five games, Galloway posted game highs in points (26) and rebounds). 

• Galloway, who is in the top 10 in the NAIA in scoring average this season, is putting up 24.6 points per game through his first five games of the season. 

• Loyola had four players score in double figures against Life, including Galloway. Milan Mejia and Matthew Mondesir each finished with 16 points, while Michael Harden had 13 points with a game-high five assists. 

• Mondesir has scored at least 10 points in both of his games thus far. 

• Blake Burkey set a new career high with nine points, hitting all four of his attempts from the field. 

• Mejia, who grabbed three steals and sunk three shots from deep against Life, leads the Wolf Pack in three-pointers made this season with 15. 

• In a small sample size of five games, Loyola has six different players shooting at least 40 percent from 3-point range. The team is currently 21st in the NAIA in team shooting percentage beyond the arc at 41.1 percent.