Basketball Game Preview: Calvary Saints vs. Peoria Christian Chargers

The Calvary Saints will venture away from home to face off against the Peoria Christian Chargers at 12:30 p.m. on Saturday. Calvary knows how to get points on the board -- the squad has finished with 55 points or more in their past five matchups -- so hopefully Peoria Christian likes a good challenge.

Calvary will head out to face Peoria Christian after giving up their first home loss of the season on Tuesday. Calvary lost to Auburn at home by a 84-66 margin. Despite running the score up even higher than they did in their prior game two weeks ago (62), the Saints still had to take the loss.

Despite the loss, Calvary got top-tier performance from Luke Blackford, who almost dropped a double-double on 31 points and nine boards. Blackford's evening made it five games in a row in which he has scored at least ten points. The team also got some help courtesy of Joshua Long, who went 6 of 8 from beyond the arc on his way to 22 points.

Meanwhile, Peoria Christian didn't have too much trouble with Prairie Central on Friday as they won 66-49. The win made it back-to-back victories for the Chargers.

Peoria Christian pushed their record up to 14-7 with the victory, which was their seventh straight at home dating back to last season. Those victories came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 66.3 points per game. As for Calvary, their defeat ended a 14-game streak of wins at home dating back to last season and dropped them to 9-5.

Calvary was able to grind out a solid win over Peoria Christian when the teams last played back in February of 2024, winning 70-57. Will Calvary repeat their success, or does Peoria Christian have a new game plan this time around? We'll find out soon enough.