Isaac Vescovi, the PSAC West Co-Player of the Week, poured in a game-high 23 points to help Pitt-Johnstown build a 22-point first half lead on its way to an 82-60 PSAC victory over Seton Hill in Wednesday's regular season home finale in the Sports Center. The Mountain Cats made it four straight wins and improved to 14-10 overall and 12-8 in the PSAC.
The Griffins kept it close early and got a dunk from Spencer Casson six minutes into the game to get Seton Hill to within two at 15-13.
However, it was all Mountain Cats the rest of the half. Pitt-Johnstown outscored the Griffins 31-14 over the final 13:40 of the half to build a 19-point advantage.
Levi Masua's layup at 10:23 got the lead into double digits, before baskets from Vescovi and
Dale Clancy made it 37-22.
Pitt-Johnstown pushed it out to 22 at 44-22 on a
Josh Wise 3-pointer at 2:32, but Seton Hill used a pair of late free-throws from Trevor Blondin to make it 46-27 at the break.
The Griffins opened the second half on a 16-9 run to cut it to 52-43 on Brandon Alston and Nathan Davis buckets, but Vescovi hit a 3-pointer, and Clancy drained three consecutive shots from behind the arc to get the Mountain Cat lead back out to 19 at 64-45 with 11:37 left.
Pitt-Johnstown built the lead to as many as 32 on
Drew Magestro's layup and free-throw at 7:18, and cruised to the 22-point victory.
Vescovi's 23 points led four Mountain Cat double figure scorers. Clancy had 18 points, five rebounds, seven assists and four steals, while
Olando King, Jr. tallied 12 points and seven rebounds, and Magestro had 10 points and six rebounds. Pitt-Johnstown also got nine points from
Josh Wise and eight points and a game-high nine rebounds from Masua.
Clancy currently stands in 10
th-place on the Mountain Cat All-Time Scoring List (1,419 points), third on the assists list (512), and fifth on the 3-point field goals list (227). Vescovi is 14
th-place on the Pitt-Johnstown Scoring List with 1,344 points.
Pitt-Johnstown, which held a 40-28 advantage on the glass, shot 53.8% (35-65) for the game, including 62.5% in the first half. The Mountain Cats were 8-17 from 3-point range and 4-4 from the free-throw line. Seton Hill shot 41.7% (25-60) from the floor, 3-18 from behind the 3-point line, and 7-11 from the charity stripe.
Blondin scored 13 points and Casson had 12 points and nine rebounds to lead the Griffins, who fell to 8-17 overall and 5-15 in the PSAC.
Pitt-Johnstown will close out the regular season with PSAC road games at Slippery Rock on Saturday and at Mercyhurst on February 21, before opening the 2018 PSAC Tournament on February 26.
