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The Eastern University men's
basketball team traveled to Dover,
Delaware to take on the Wesley
Wolverines and to try to bounce back
from a bad night on Thursday. The
Eagles gave a solid effort, but 31
points from Wesley's sophomore
standout Rashawn Johnson proved to
be too much as the host Wolverines
built a big lead midway through the
second half and held on to win
78-75.
Eastern sophomore guard Ty Coleman
made his first start of the year in
an attempt to slow down Johnson, but
became a big part of the Eastern
attack as he hit all seven of his
first half shots for 17 points to
lead the Eagles to a 34-33 halftime
lead. The Eagles shot a 74% in the
first half, but could only manage 19
shots. The Wolverines forced 13
turnovers and grabbed eleven
offensive rebounds to generate 36
shots. The hosts hit just 12, but
Johnson still found a way to score
15 first half points.
Eastern's David Volpe went to the
bench early with foul trouble and
Wesley's Evan Martin hit for ten of
his 16 points in the first half. The
Eagles held the statistical
advantage on the boards for the
first half, but as they only missed
five field goals, there were very
few defensive rebounds for the
Wolverines to grab.
After
Matt Malloy hit an inside bucket on
a nice feed from Mike Johnson to put
the Eagles up 36-33 lead, the host
Wolverines went on a 9-2 run to take
the lead for good in the game. A
Volpe three pointer cut the Wesley
advantage to 42-41 with fifteen
minutes to play. After the
Wolverines scored the next two
baskets, Volpe penetrated deep into
the Wesley defense and kicked the
ball out to Johnson who nailed the
open three to close the gap back to
two points. RaShawn Johnson answered
at the other end with a bucket.
After
both teams had unproductive
possessions, the Wolverines hit 7 of
8 shots in a three minute spurt to
push a four point advantage to a
66-51 lead with eight and a half
minutes to play. Wesley hit four
three pointers in the run with
Johnson connecting on a pair and
Rogelio Burton also hitting two.
Down
15, the Eagles responded with a 10-0
run of their own. Mike Johnson
started the run with a spinning lay
up and made a decisive play in the
run when he caught a Wolverine shot
on the way up and fired it forward
to Jason Reels who made a pair of
free throws. David Volpe scored 11
of his 14 points in the last 10
minutes of the game, and it looked
as though the Eagles might pull even
at 71, but Coleman's short runner
rolled out with 1:38 to play, and
the Wolverines hit a free throw at
the other end to push the advantage
back up to 72-69.
After
Johnson hit a pair of free throws
for Wesley, Volpe connected on a
three point play to cut the deficit
back to two, but the hosts were able
to hang on for the 78-75 win. Lenny
DiMaria scored ten points in the
second half to join Coleman with 17
points for the game. Johnson had a
game high 13 rebounds and 16 points
for the Eagles.
Eastern, which drops to 5-5 in PAC
play returns to action Monday night
at Gwynedd-Mercy College.
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