LINDSBORG - A sharp-shooting Kansas Wesleyan Men's Basketball squad used a big first-half run to pull away and roll to an 80-67 win over the arch-rival Bethany Swedes on Wednesday night at Hahn Gym.
We knew we had to come out, we had to (take control) early," KWU head coach Jordan Murdock said on the post-game radio show. "I think that's one thing that we really do a good job of as a team is just making sure that most games we start out all right."
The 13-point margin was not indicative of KWU's control of the game. The Coyotes were up 24 with five minutes left and emptied the bench and Bethany made a run to close things out to the 80-67 final.
Wesleyan raced out to a 14-3 lead in the first five minutes of the contest on a 3-pointer by Matthew Garber, but the Swedes stayed close, making it 21-13 with 10:18 left in the first.
It was 25-17 KWU when things turned in favor of the Coyotes. Aiden Leckband converted a lay-up to put the Coyotes up 37-22 with 3:04 left in the first, capping a 12-5 run for Wesleyan.
Bethany pressed back at the end of the half, cutting the lead to eight at intermission thanks to a 7-0 run to close out the half.
"I thought in the second or that at the end of that first half, we got a little shaky with the turnovers and stuff like that. But they answered the call where we came back out in the second half, and I think that was the difference," Murdock said.
Bethany scored the first points of the second half, cutting it to five, but after that it was all Coyotes.
An 8-0 KWU run pushed the difference back out to 13 at 45-32 on a bucket by Evens Appolon with 17:16 left.
Wesleyan continued to pull away, taking a 59-39 lead with 12:23 left on free throws by Stefan Spray after a Bethany foul was upgraded to a Flagrant 1.
Hall's layup with 5:16 left put the Coyotes up 24.
Brandon Avedon led the Coyotes with 19 points while Appolon had 13, Garber 11 and Spray 10 as KWU was 31 of 57 from the field for 54.4 percent for the game. Appolon, Caiden Punt and Gabe Phillips had five rebounds each helping KWU to a 35-32 margin on the glass.
"A win like this just gives us a ton of confidence. It shows us how good we are when we stick to what we need to do, stick to the game plan," Murdock said. "The rest of the way we just have to control what we can control. The biggest thing is us taking care of business, stick to the game plan, get the turnovers under control and we will be fine."