NEW WILMINGTON, Pa. – The Westminster men's basketball team won its third-straight game following a 71-51 win over Waynesburg in Presidents' Athletic Conference (PAC) action at home Tuesday night.
Sophomore
Andrew Clark (New Middletown, OH / Springfield Local) earned his third-straight double-double, following a 11-point 12-rebound (tied a game-high) performance.
"Whatever I can do to help my team," Clark said. "If it is rebounding or scoring. We have a lot of guys that can do a lot of stuff so I do whatever I can do to help the team win."
Senior
Daniel Ritter (North Lima, OH / South Range) led the Titan scorers with 17 points, followed by sophomore
Reese Leone (Beloit, OH / West Branch) with 16. Senior
Josh Hutcherson (Uniontown, OH / Uniontown Lake) tied Clark with a game-high 12 boards, to go along with eight points. Leone also dished out a team-high four assists and made a game-high four three-pointers. The Titans pulled away in the first half with nine three-pointers.
"That was not the game plan, but guys were making them," Head Coach
Kevin Siroki said when asked about the made threes in the first half. "I thought we did a really good job of going inside out and that really helps you when you throw the ball inside to the big guys first and then they kick it out. It makes the defense move so I am really proud of what we did in the first half. Especially, stopping (Matt) Popeck, he is a really great player."
Popeck was averaging over 20 points per game coming into tonight's game, at the top of the PAC rankings. The Titan defense held him to nine points tonight, his only single-digit performance of the season.
Waynesburg (8-5, 4-2 PAC) had an early 7-1 lead. Westminster (9-5, 6-2 PAC) worked its way in front and took its first lead at 13-11, following a three by junior
Tyler James (Youngstown, OH / Warren JFK) with 12 minutes to go in the first half. The Titans took their first double-digit lead at 27-17 with 8:24 on the clock. Westminster dominated the final eight minutes, outscoring the Yellow Jackets 19-4 and had a commanding 46-21 lead at halftime. Westminster led in double-digits the rest of the game.
"That is one of our keys and I thought everyone did a really good job," Siroki said about the defense. "
Anthony Ritter and Jordon Zupko did a great job of guarding Popeck. The rest of the guys helped out, grabbed rebounds, and got down the floor. I am so proud of their defensive effort. They are tired, but we will bounce back. We have practice tomorrow and come back and play Thursday."
The Titans are back on the court Thursday, Jan. 20 as host of PAC foe Grove City. The game will be broadcasted live by WKBN as its Game of the Week. Tip-off is slated for 8 p.m.
