WEST LIBERTY \u2013\u00a0 It\u2019s faster to count by threes than it is by twos and the \u201c3s\u201d were\u00a0 adding up pretty quickly for unbeaten and No. 1-ranked West Liberty once\u00a0 again Thursday night at the ASRC.<\/p>\n
The West Virginia\u00a0 Conference-leading Hilltoppers swished five 3-point shots in the first\u00a0 four minutes to take a double-digit lead and kept right on rolling to a\u00a0 100-66 victory against a Pitt-Johnstown team which entered the game\u00a0 holding down third place in the WVIAC standings.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt always helps when\u00a0 you come out and make your first four or five 3-pointers,\u201d smiled West\u00a0 Liberty head coach Jim Crutchfield after his Hilltoppers (22-0, 18-0)\u00a0 put the finishing touches on their school record-tying 22nd consecutive\u00a0 victory.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe shared the ball\u00a0 very well tonight and got a lot of clean looks, which is a big key for\u00a0 us. We have a lot of guys on this team who are capable of shooting the\u00a0 three. When they have time to catch the ball and square up, they should\u00a0 shoot a pretty high percentage.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was certainly the\u00a0 case Thursday night as West Liberty \u2013 which leads the nation in 3-point\u00a0 field goals and 3-point field goal percentage \u2013 got 3-point field goals\u00a0 from four different players in the first 3:46 to grab a 15-4 lead and\u00a0 the Mountain Cats (13-8, 10-7) never recovered.<\/p>\n
Barry Shetzer\u2019s fourth\u00a0 3-pointer of the first half opened up a 20-point lead, 31-11, as the\u00a0 clock ticked past the 10-minute mark and the hosts coasted into\u00a0 intermission with a 51-28 lead.<\/p>\n
Pitt-Johnstown never\u00a0 got the gap under 20 points the rest of the night and West Liberty led\u00a0 by as many as 36 points down the stretch before settling for the\u00a0 34-point final margin.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought our defense\u00a0 and rebounding was a big part of that fast start,\u201d Crutchfield said.\u00a0 \u201cJohn Wolosinczuk and Chris Morrow did a very good job on the big\u00a0 (Patrick) Grubbs kid in the post and even though we didn\u2019t miss a lot of\u00a0 shots, we ran down a lot of offensive rebounds to give ourselves second\u00a0 and third chances.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeating people to\u00a0 loose balls and running down those long rebounds is a lot more important\u00a0 than having a good shooting night. Everyone has \u2018off\u2019 shooting nights\u00a0 from time to time over the course of the season but hustle is something\u00a0 you can control.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shetzer led West\u00a0 Liberty with 24 points, 9 rebounds and 5 assists while Corey Pelle added\u00a0 14 points. Morrow had a double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds in\u00a0 just 14 minutes of playing time off the bench while Wolosinczuk and\u00a0 Alex Falk rounded out the double-figure scorers with 12 points each.<\/p>\n
Nick Novak had 17\u00a0 points to pace a Pitt-Johnstown team which shot just 37 percent\u00a0 (25-of-66) from the floor and 27 percent (6-of-22) from the 3-point arc\u00a0 and had just 7 assists to go with 20 turnovers.<\/p>\n
The Hilltoppers posted\u00a0 a whopping 52-34 rebounding advantage and were charted with 24 assists\u00a0 and a dozen steals to balance 15 turnovers.<\/p>\n
After\u00a0 enjoying a rare weekend off, West Liberty returns to action Monday\u00a0 night with a tough WVIAC road test at regionally-ranked\u00a0 Alderson-Broaddus. Tipoff is set for 7:30 p.m. in Philippi.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WEST LIBERTY \u2013\u00a0 It\u2019s faster to count by threes than it is by twos and the \u201c3s\u201d were\u00a0 adding up pretty quickly for unbeaten and No. 1-ranked West Liberty once\u00a0 again Thursday night at the ASRC. The West Virginia\u00a0 Conference-leading Hilltoppers swished five 3-point shots in the first\u00a0 four minutes to take a double-digit lead […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-college"],"yoast_head":"\n