WEST CHESTER, Pa.- The West Chester men's basketball team (5-2, 0-2 PSAC) entered play on Saturday night following a hard-fought loss vs Pitt-Johnstown on Friday night looking for a win against the No. 7/3 IUP Crimson Hawks (7-0, 2-0 PSAC). The game remained close throughout much the early going with the two teams trading baskets and West Chester leading by as many as four points in the early going but the Crimson Hawks closed the first with an impressive run to earn a 103-81 victory over the Golden Rams.
Through the first six minutes of play, the Golden Rams and Crimson Hawks showed exactly why it is such a highly-anticipated matchup whenever these two teams meet, trading baskets to the tune of 14-14 with 14:07 to play in the first half.
After continuing to trade baskets for the next few minutes and the score being tied at 18-18, IUP closed the first half on a 33-16 run to take a commanding 51-34 lead into the halftime break.
Jamil Manigo (Philadelphia, Pa./Bishop McDevitt) led the Golden Rams in scoring with eight points in the first half while Shawndale Jones scored a game-high 14 points in the opening 20 minutes.
As a team, West Chester shot 40.0% (12-of-30) from the field while going 3-for-10 (30.0 %) from beyond the arc and just 7-of-12 (58.3 %) from the line while IUP shot 55.9 % (19-for-34) from the field and 10-for-12 (83.3 %) from the line.
In the second half, West Chester attempted to battle back but it was to no avail as IUP used its large first half lead and a 52-point second half to roll to a 103-81 victory over the Golden Rams.
Kyle McGee (Jersey City, N.J./St. Mary's of the Assumption) and
Marcus Littles (Philadelphia, Pa./Neumann-Goretti) tied for the team lead in scoring with 13 points each while
Robert Smith (Philadelphia, Pa./Bishop McDevitt) and Manigo ended with 12 and 10 points each. Littles also tied with Dade for the team high in rebounding, pulling five rebounds each while West Chester registered 35 rebounds as a team. Slay led the team in assists with five helpers on the night while also coming away with a team-best five steals in the setback.
Despite the setback, West Chester's bench outscored IUP's bench by an impressive 40-7 margin while the Golden Rams also ended the game with 12-10 edge in fast break points.
For IUP, Armoni Foster had a huge night coming off scoring his 1000
th point on Friday night, scoring 33 points while coming away with 7 rebounds while Ethan Porterfield registered 21 points and five rebounds of his own. Jones, who entered play as one of the top scorers in DII, had a big night as well, scoring 13 points while also coming away with five rebounds while Dave Morris played the facilitator role, scoring 13 points with seven assists and seven rebounds in the victory.
IUP ended the contest with a +3 edge in rebounding (38-35) while also outshooting West Chester from the field and from three-point range (52.3 % vs 43.5 % FG % and 36.4 % vs 19.2 % 3-PT %) in the convincing PSAC crossover victory.
West Chester will be off next week before returning to action on Tuesday the 14
th at Seton Hill beginning at 4:30 p.m.
