Men's Basketball 6/13/2013 3:12:00 PM

Mountain Cats Fall at Home to Wheeling Jesuit

02/07/2011

Wheeling Jesuit (WV) University built a 20-point first half advantage and went on to hand the Mountain Cats their first home loss of the season with a 93-78 victory in the Sports Center, Monday night. Jordan Miller's (Vinco, Pa.) 18 points led five Mountain Cats who scored in double-figures. Pitt-Johnstown has lost three of its last four and slipped to 13-7 overall and 10-6 in the WVIAC.
Andre Harris' basket three minutes into the game gave Wheeling Jesuit a 9-4 lead. The Mountain Cats answered with consecutive three-pointers from Danny Branch (Washington, D.C.) and Bill Luther (Gibsonia, Pa.) to take their only lead of the half at 10-9 a minute later.
The Cardinals regained the lead at 12-10 and made it a six-point advantage at 21-15 on Obi Ukwuoma basket in the paint at 13:16. Pitt-Johnstown got a three-pointer from Jordan Miller (Vinco, Pa.) with just under 11 minutes remaining in the half to pull to within one at 23-22.
However, Wheeling Jesuit outscored Pitt-Johnstown 29-13 the rest of the half to take a commanding 17-point lead.
Harris scored at the six-minute mark to push the Wheeling Jesuit lead into double-digits, before another Ukwuoma lay-up extended the lead to 20 with 24 seconds left.
Miller connected on his third three-pointer of the first half as time expired to cut the Mountain Cat deficit to 52-35 at the break.
Pitt-Johnstown opened the second half with a 17-5 run to make it 57-52 on Patrick Grubbs' (Turtle Creek, Pa.) basket at 12:59.
Brad DuPont's basket two minutes later got Wheeling Jesuit's lead back to 11 at 68-57.
Nick Novak's (Murrysville, Pa.) bucket at 8:37 got the Mountain Cats to within seven at 70-63, but another Harris basket increased the Cardinals' lead to 81-68 with 5:08 to play.
The Mountain Cats never got closer than nine the rest of the way.
Miller led the Mountain Cats with 18 points (4 three-pointers), four rebounds and a team-high seven assists. Grubbs and Branch each scored 16 points, while Grubbs pulled down a team-high 10 rebounds. Luther collected 14 points and five rebounds, and Novak rounded out the double-figure scorers with 12 points, three rebounds and four assists.
Branch, who holds the Mountain Cat career-record for three-pointers with 238, also ranks seventh on the Pitt-Johnstown All-Time Scoring List with 1,362 points. Grubbs is tied with Don Elzer (1973-77) for 13th-place on the scoring list with 1,147 points and fourth on the all-time rebounding list with 683.
Pitt-Johnstown shot 43.9% (29-66) from the field, 12-30 from three-point range, and a perfect 8-8 from the free-throw line. Wheeling Jesuit ended the night shooting 57.8% (37-64) from the floor with seven three-pointers. The Cardinals, who held slim 34-32 advantage in rebounding, were also 12-16 from the charity stripe.
Harris led all scorers with 23 points and nine rebounds. Ukwuoma added 19 points, and Marquis Moore chipped in 18 points off the bench for Wheeling Jesuit. In addition, Ben Siefert tallied 13 points, 10 assists and eight steals for the Cardinals, who improved to 12-8 overall and 9-8 in the WVIAC.
The Mountain Cats travel to No. 1-ranked West Liberty (WV) University for a WVIAC game on Thursday, before hosting a doubleheader with the Lady Cats against Alderson-Broaddus (WV) College for Breast Cancer Awareness Day on Saturday. The Lady Cats will tip-off at 2 p.m., followed by the men's game at 4 p.m.

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