Men's Basketball | 11/20/2016 12:05:00 AM

WEST LIBERTY, W.Va. – The No. 1-ranked West Liberty University men's basketball remained unbeaten on the young season here Saturday afternoon by running away to a 94-72 win against Notre Dame (Ohio) in a mutual Mountain East Conference opener at the ASRC.
Coach Jim Crutchfield's Hilltoppers (4-0, 1-0) led by as many as 20 points in the early minutes of the second half before the Falcons (3-1, 0-1) put together a sustained charge.
Trailing 62-42 after a conventional 3-point play by WLU's Zac Grossenbacher, Notre Dame caught fire when junior post Will Vorhees was fouled while dropping in a layup at the other end. Vorhees missed the free throw but the rebound kicked out to Kobie Johnson, who drained a 3-pointer to make it 62-47 with just over 14 minutes remaining.
Johnson, Vorhees and Ja'Sean Lewis all hit clutch shots during a blurry fast Falcon run that trimmed the margin to 63-55 with 12 minutes still to play. Notre Dame got as close as seven points on three separate occasions but could come no closer.
"That 5-point play really gave them a lift," Crutchfield said, "and they followed up on that with some 3-point shots but I thought once they got the lead under 10 points, we did a pretty good job of countering their run with some really good offense."
A rebound basket by Lewis cut the WLU lead to 72-65 with 7:20 remaining but Devin Hoehn fed Zac Grossenbacher for a 3-pointer from the corner and the margin never dropped below double-digits again as the Hilltoppers put the game out of reach with a 17-3 run over the next three minutes.
A pair of free throws by Dennis capped the surge, putting West Liberty up, 87-70, with a little more than 4 minutes remaining and the Hilltoppers coasted to the 22-point win.
"That was a much closer game than the final score shows," Crutchfield said. "Notre Dame's a really good basketball team that has already beaten some really good basketball teams. I thought we passed the ball pretty well tonight and did a good job getting into the gaps of the zone to create good quality scoring opportunities.
"All in all, we got a lot of contributions from a lot of people tonight and we needed that. This was a very good win."
Grossenbacher finished with 21 points and 9 rebounds while Hoehn matched the 21 points and had 4 assists to go along with his 5 rebounds. Dennis had another outstanding game with 20 points, 6 assists and 4 steals while Dan Monteroso posted his first career double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds, not to mention a pair of highlight-reel blocked shots. Brandon Smith came off the bench to add 10 points.
Vorhees, a returning All-MEC standout, was virtually unstoppable with 32 points and 12 rebounds. Oliver Megins and Lewis joined him in double-figures with 11 and 10 points, respectively.
The Hilltoppers return to the ASRC boards on Monday with a 7:30 p.m. game against Urbana.