Franklin men's basketball has had game where it felt like it couldn't miss a shot. Wednesday night was not one of them.

A frigid shooting night — 21 of 77 from the field (27.3%) — left the Grizzlies swimming upstream all the way through what turned into a 69-54 loss at Anderson in the HCAC opener for both teams.

"You've got to score more points than the other team to win," Griz coach Chris Hamilton said, summarizing the evening rather succinctly.

Down 27-15 early, Franklin (3-3, 0-1) was able to cut the deficit to 31-27 by halftime and eventually got as close as 35-32 on a Jesse Faires 3-pointer with 17:29 left in the game. The host Ravens, though, scored the next 13 points to take control of the game for good, leaving the Grizzlies in a 48-32 hole with 13:44 to go.

Franklin briefly made it a single-digit game when a Justin Harrington layup made it 59-50 with 3:57 to go, but the visitors were unable to get any closer.

Freshman Rohan Pearson scored 21 points off the bench on 9-of-16 shooting to lead the Grizzlies in a losing effort. The rest of the team, though, was a combined 12 of 61 overall and 5 of 31 from 3-point range. Cooper Matthews finished with 12 points, Faires had eight points and 12 rebounds and Dylan Beverly contributed seven points, seven boards and three blocked shots.

The Grizzlies will attempt to revert to their sharper-shooting mean on Saturday when they travel to Hanover for an afternoon women's/men's doubleheader.