Freshman guard Drew Prehmus (Atlanta, GA/Wesleyan School) paced the Tigers with a career-high 18 points, while junior center Aaron Lewek (Raleigh, NC/Leesville Road) tallied his second double-double of the season with 12 points and 11 caroms to lead Hampden-Sydney to its biggest margin of victory of the season. The Tigers held a 40-18 halftime advantage thanks to a 60 percent (15-of-25) shooting effort in the first half.
In the second half, the Tigers led by as much as 26 points (52-26), thanks to an A.J. Dowell (Roanoke, VA/Salem) layup with 14:44 to play. However, Eastern battled back to cut the Tiger lead down to 16 (56-40) after a pair of free throws by Ryan Tozer and a three by David Volpe at the 11:36 mark. That would be as close as the Eagles could get as the Tigers eventually pushed the lead back to 26 (77-51) with a Matt Green (Richmond, VA/Thomas Dale) three pointer, while buckets by Joe Manzo and Matt Malloy by Eastern down the stretch made the final Tiger advantage 21 points, 81-60.
Brian Gunn (Danville, VA/GW Danville) finished with 12 points to give the Tigers three players in double-figures in scoring, while A.J. Dowell finished with a career-high eight points. The Tigers finished the game shooting 53 percent (31-58) from the floor, 36 percent (9-for-25) from beyond the arc and 71 percent (10-of-14) from the line, while out-rebounding the Eagles, 37-31.
Joe Manzo finished with nine points to lead the Eagles, while Chris McMonagle, Brent Voorhees, Eric Houston and David Volpe each finished with eight points. The Eagles shot 42 percent (21-for-50) from the floor, 35 percent (6-for-17) from three point range and 46 percent (12-for-26) from the line, while both teams committed 23 turnovers.
In the second game of the afternoon, Chad Clark scored 17 points to lead four Baldwin-Wallace players in double-figures as the Yellow Jackets cruised to an 88-58 victory. Keith Aufmuth tallied 15 points on five-of-five shooting from beyond the arc, while Tom Harrington added ten points to go with his game-high 11 assists. Meanwhile, Charod Hale added ten points and a team-high nine boards off the bench.
Santo Provenzano added 19 points for Hood, while Sean Robine scored 15 to give the Blazers two double-digit point producers.
For the game, Hood shot just 28 percent (17-for-61) from the floor, including just 14 percent (2-for-14) from three point land. The Blazers did manage to knock down 22-of-27 from the line.
Baldwin-Wallace made seven of its first eight shots attempts for the game en route to shooting 52 percent (35-for-68) for the contest, including an 11-for-25 (44%) mark from beyond the arc. The Yellow Jackets forced 19 turnovers and out-rebounded Hood, 44-39.