The Washington State men’s basketball team learned a lesson during its 81-74 win over Lewis Clark-State Friday night: No matter who the opponent is, any team at the collegiate level is capable of scoring.

The Cougars saw a 27-point lead, with less than nine minutes remaining in the second half, immediately slip to single digits in the final minute of the game.

In the last 10 minutes, Lewis-Clark outscored the Cougars 30-12. The Warriors took advantage of nine Cougar turnovers during that stretch.

“What these guys will learn is that it doesn’t matter who you’re playing, everybody can score at this level,” Head Coach Ernie Kent said in the postgame press conference. “If you’re not locked in on your defensive assignment, you’re forgetting to rotate, and not ready to move your feet and play defense, anybody can score.”

The Warriors relied heavily on their 3-point shooting, hitting 12-36 from behind the arc, which also helped them get back in the game against the Cougars.

“When you start throwing up 36 threes, that’s a lot of threes,” Kent said. “When you get up on a team, the tendency is to relax a little bit and then all of a sudden trying to get guys in and out of the game, and guys kind of got lost at times on defensive assignments, and shooting that many threes, you’re going to make your fair share of them.”

Kent decided to play all 12 active players against the Warriors, and also mixed in different lineups throughout the game. The only player who did not see action for the Cougars was junior center Connor Clifford, who did not suit up because of a groin injury he is dealing with.

“I wanted to play everybody in the game tonight, got some strange combinations out there,” Kent said. “It’s hard to fly in and out of games, be stiff and jump back in there, but I wanted everybody to get on the floor so we can look at tape, and teach, and make corrections, and things of that nature.”

Six players made their Cougar debuts Friday night, but it was junior guard Charles Callison who stole show by throwing down a couple dunks in the first half, bringing the crowd to its feet.

“(The dunks) really helped me get the jitters out and made me feel more comfortable with myself within the game,” Callison said.

The California native got the start over sophomore guard Ny Redding at the point guard position and finished with 10 points and three assists.

Junior forward Josh Hawkinson was the focal point of the offense for the majority of the night against the Warriors. He tallied a team high of 29 points and grabbed nine rebounds for the Cougars.

“I thought I saw a bunch of different lineup groups that we went with and just kind of trying to work out which ones worked and which ones meshed with each other,” Hawkinson said. “I think that’s the main thing when you have seven new guys just trying to figure out the chemistry and the cohesiveness within our team.”

The Cougars will play their second and final exhibition game of the 2015 season at 6 p.m. Friday against Pacific University in Bohler Gym.