Their eyes possibly focused on a Saturday afternoon date with perennial rival Algonquin—and their minds clearly not on playing defence—the St. Lawrence Vikings gained a 106-93 victory Friday night over the visiting La Cite Coyotes in an Ontario Colleges Athletic Asociation men’s basketball game.

In a run-and-gun affair that flew in the face of coach Barry Smith’s defence-first orientation, the Vikings found themselves in tough against the lowly Coyotes, who came to town with a 2-9 record. Nonetheless, St. Lawrence scored often enough to secure its fifth-straight win.

From the Vikings’ perspective, it was a sloppy affair. Twenty-one of La Cite’s 43 first-half points, for instance, arose from 14 St. Lawrence turnovers. Still, the Vikings led by eight, 51-43, at the intermission.

Jaz Bain led St. Lawrence with 35 points, 20 of them in the first half. He also had 11 assists and five steals. Donald Gibson had 23 points and 10 rebounds for the Vikings, who got 24 points and eight rebounds from Andrew Dawkins, who was 5-for-8 from three-point range.

At the end of play Friday, St. Lawrence, 7-5, finds itself in a fifth-place tie with idle Seneca, half a game behind fourth-place Loyalist, an 82-69 winner over Algonquin Friday night. The loss dropped the Thunder into a seventh-place tie with George Brown at 6-6.

The top six teams in the East division will make the playoffs.

Saturday’s game with Algonquin will start at 3 p.m., after the two schools’ women’s teams stage a battle for first place in the East at 1 o’clock.