The University of Regina's men's basketball team opened up the Canada West quarterfinals in Lethbridge on Thursday night with a 115-68 loss to the Pronghorns in Game 1 of the best-of-three series.
 
It was all Pronghorns from the opening buzzer.
 
Lethbridge came out shooting absolute fire from beyond the arc, as the home team hit seven of eight three-point attempts in the first quarter to sprint out to a 33-13 lead after the opening period. Colton Gibb had three of those triples in the first quarter while Lethbridge also had three-pointers from Dejon Burdeaux, Brett Warren, and Josh Sparkes.
 
And the Pronghorns built their momentum from there, outscoring the Cougars in all of the next three quarters as well. Lethbridge took a 55-27 lead into halftime, led 89-48 after three, and cruised to victory in the fourth with both teams giving extended minutes to their bench.
 
The Zac Overwater/Burdeaux duo led Lethbridge with 24 points and 22 points, respectively. Overwater also led all players with 11 rebounds for a double-double, while the Pronghorns also got 19 points from Gibb, 15 from Saren Westrop, 14 from Awak Piom, and 10 points and seven assists from Kyle Peterson.
 
Brandon Tull led the Cougars with 13 points.
 
Lethbridge ended up shooting 53% from the field in the first half including 8-for-13 on three-pointers. The Pronghorns finished the game shooting 49.3% overall and hit 12 of their 21 attempts from downtown. Gibb led the way by going 4-for-6 from three-point land, while Westrop went 3-for-4 and Overwater was 2-for-3. Regina also turned the ball over 26 times compared to 18 for Lethbridge.
 
The two teams will meet again on Friday night in Lethbridge with the Cougars facing elimination.
 
NOTES: Thursday's game was the first ever postseason meeting between the two teams ... the winner of this quarterfinal series will advance to the Canada West semifinals against the winner of the Alberta/UNBC series.