December 1, 2015 (Men's Basketball)
    (With this year's intercollegiate athletic seasons put on hold due to health concerns, let's take a look back at previous Hilltopper happenings on this date. Five years ago tonight, Seger Bonifant became West Liberty's all-time leader in career 3-pointers during a 50-point blowout win against Salem International.)
Box Score
    WEST LIBERTY, W.Va. – Seger Bonifant set a West Liberty career record for 3-pointers and Coach Jim Crutchfield's Hilltoppers celebrated their return to the No. 1 spot in the NCAA Division II Top 25 Tuesday night with a 128-78 rout of Salem International in non-conference action at the ASRC.
    Bonifant, who led all scorers with 22 points in just 19 minutes of action, took a drop pass from Beau Justice in transition and drained a 20-footer from just left of the key with 12:56 showing on the second half clock to break Barry Shetzer's previous school record of 284 career bonus bombs.
    It was the fourth 3-pointer of the night for the senior All-American, who leads all active NCAA Division II players in games played (108), 3-point field goals (285) and 3-point field goal percentage (285-531, .537). His career 3-point field goal percentage is an NCAA Division II record.
    "I had no idea Seger was that close but he doesn't have to stop there. I'm planning on him making a few more before he's finished," Crutchfield said with a smile. "Seriously, though, the best thing about Seger is that despite all the awards he's won – and all the awards he's going to win – the only thing he really cares about is winning."
    The unbeaten Hilltoppers (6-0) had little trouble taking care of that business on Tuesday. A few hours after taking over the No. 1 spot in the national coaches' poll, they opened up a 21-point lead, 37-16, against the visiting Tigers (1-5) at 8:15 of the first half and never looked back.
    "I saw on the release that this was the sixth straight year we've been ranked No. 1 at some point in the season," Crutchfield said. "That's pretty hard to believe. Polls don't mean a whole lot, especially in December, but it's certainly a great compliment to the history and tradition of our program and the university to have that level of respect at the national level."
    With Tuesday's game tipping off a stretch of three games in five nights, Crutchfield substituted early and often with every player in uniform getting at least 11 minutes of action and nobody coming close to 30. When the final buzzer sounded, no less than seven West Liberty players had hit double-figures.
    Bonifant led all scorers but he had plenty of support as WLU shot nearly 59 percent (51-of-87) from the floor, handed out a whopping 35 assists and built a 56-40 advantage off the glass.
    "The goal tonight was the same as it is every night," Crutchfield said. "We want to walk off the court with a win. I also wanted to get everybody involved and we were successful with that, as well. Everybody scored, everybody had a rebound, everybody had at least two assists and nobody played a lot of minutes. It was a nice team win."
    Zac Grossenbacher posted a double-double with 14 points and 11 rebounds while Brady Arnold and Justice added 16 and 15 points, respectively, off the bench. Hoehn also scored 14 points while David Dennis had a dozen and Tyler Primmer tossed in 11. Mike Lamberti had 6 points but dished out 7 assists and came up with 4 steals – both game-highs.
    Gerard Tarin had a double-double with 17 points and 10 rebounds to pace five double-figure scorers for Salem International.