Men's Basketball | 2/6/2014 9:32:00 PM
Box Score
ATHENS, W.Va. – No. 5-ranked West Liberty used a big second half to move one step closer to a Mountain East Conference title here Thursday night, pulling away to a 97-76 victory against Concord at the Mountain Lions' Carter Center.
After Thursday's convincing win, Coach Jim Crutchfield's Hilltoppers (19-1, 15-1) have a four-game lead over their closest pursuers with only six regular season games remaining on the MEC's regular-season slate.
Concord (7-15, 4-12), which had battled WLU to the wire before falling short, 97-92, in last month's first meeting at the ASRC, battled the nationally-ranked Hilltoppers on nearly even terms for the first 20 minutes.
Cedric Harris put West Liberty ahead to stay, 41-39, with a conventional 3-point play just 3 seconds before the end of a see-saw first half that had seen 5 ties and 8 lead changes.
It was all Hilltoppers when play resumed, however, as the Black and Gold outscored the Mountain Lions, 20-3, over the first 5 minutes of the second half.
That surge was capped by a 15-0 run over a 3-minute span that put West Liberty up, 61-42, following a Kelvin Goodwin 3-pointer with 14:52 left to play.
The Hilltoppers maintained control the rest of the way, leading by as many as 28 points down the stretch before settling for the final margin.
West Liberty shot 60 percent (21-of-35) from the floor in the second half and fell just one field goal short of shooting 60 percent for the game (38-of-64, 59.4 percent).
C.J. Hester led all scorers for the winners with a season-high 25 points to go along with 8 rebounds. Goodwin, who returned to the court after sitting out the last 3 games due to illness, added 15 points in 15 minutes off the bench and Keene Cockburn added 13 points, 5 rebounds and 3 blocked shots.
Harris turned in 11 points and 4 assists for his night's work and Devin Hoehn rounded out the double-figure scorers with 10 points.
Mike Boyd had 18 points to lead Concord.
The Hilltoppers will try to clinch their 10th consecutive 20-win season on Saturday when they travel to UVA-Wise for a 4 p.m. tipoff.
