BEREA, OHIO -- Senior guard Nate Stahl and senior forward Ross Niekamp scored 13 points each as the eighth-ranked Capital University men's basketball team defeated Baldwin-Wallace College, 93-64, today (Saturday, January 24, 2009) in an Ohio Athletic Conference game at the Capital Center in Columbus. The win was the 10th straight for the Crusaders while the Yellow Jackets suffered their fourth straight loss.
With its win, Capital improves to 16-1 overall and is in first place in the OAC at 9-1. With its loss, B-W falls to 6-11 overall and 2-8 in the OAC.
In addition to Stahl, who grabbed a game-high seven rebounds, and Niekamp for the Crusaders, senior forward Quintin Mitchell added 10 points. For B-W, senior forward Andrew Bene (Hinckley/ Medina Highland) scored a team-high 10 points. Freshman forward John Pickett (Norwalk/ Collins Western Reserve) came off the bench to score a career-best eight points and freshman guard Matt Triana (North East, Pa./ North East)scored the first six points of his career.
In the first half, Capital utilized runs of eight, six, eight and 10 points to take a 17-point lead at halftime. The Crusaders opened the game with an 8-0 lead when senior forward Casey Brown made two free throws at the 16:28 mark. B-W answered with a layup from Bene at the 16:13 mark, but Capital capped a 6-0 run to take a 14-2 lead when Stahl connected on a jump shot with 14:18 to play in the opening stanza.
Capital extended its lead to 18 points at 22-4 when Stahl scored on a fastbreak layup, was fouled, and completed the old-fashioned three point play with a free throw at the 12:10 mark. The Yellow Jackets were able to cut Capital's lead to 12 on three separate occasions, with the last coming at 26-14 with 9:34 left when Bene made two free throws.
From there, Capital put together a 10-0 run aided by two layups from Mitchell and capped at the 5:19 mark when junior guard Ben McGrath connected on two free throws to give the Crusaders a 36-14 advantage.
B-W outscored Capital 18-13 to close the half and trailed 49-32 at the intermission. Junior guard Louis Tumblin (Elyria/ Senior) knocked down a jumper with 1:00 left to cut the Crusader lead to 47-32 and gave BW some momentum headed into halftime.
In the second half, Capital extended its lead to as many as 38 points on two separate occasions, with the last coming at 85-47 with 6:51 to play when junior forward Miles Weaver scored on a layup. B-W closed the game by outscoring the Crusaders 17-8 as Triana and Pickett teamed to account for 12 of those points.
The Yellow Jackets return to action on Wednesday, Jan. 28 when they host OAC-rival Mount Union College in the Rudolph Ursprung Gymnasium in the Lou Higgins Recreation Center in Berea at 7:30 p.m.
Media and fans are reminded that they can listen to all remaining BW men's and women's basketball games LIVE on campus radio station WBW, 88.3 FM, and/ or via the WBW Internet web site at www.wBW.com . All home games are on Internet and all away games are both on radio and the Internet.
FOR MORE INFORMATION, please contact B-W Sports Information Director Kevin Ruple by telephone at 440-826-2327, by FAX machine at 440-826-2329 or via e-mail at kruple@bw.edu. To contact Head Coach Duane Sheldon, please call 440-826-2115 or e-mail at dsheldon@bw.edu. You can get all of the latest B-W athletics information by visiting our Web site at www.bw.edu/athletics.
