Box Score West Chester 85, Kutztown 71 (HTML Box Score)
KUTZTOWN, Pa. – The Kutztown University men's basketball team had its near-comeback in the second half fall short as it fell to West Chester University 85-71 on Saturday afternoon in a Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) Eastern Division game at Keystone Arena.
Kutztown (2-4, 1-2 PSAC East) went bucket-for-bucket with the Golden Rams (6-2, 3-1) in the early going. It made its first 10 free throws and led 17-16 midway through the first half.
The Golden Rams stretched their lead from 29-26 with 5:09 left in the first half, to 59-36 early in the second half. West Chester broke open a substantial lead with a sizable 31-10 run, in which it shot 9-for-13 from the field, made four of its nine three-pointers of the game, shot 9-of-10 from the free throw line, and forced five Kutztown turnovers.
The fight in Kutztown's youthful team showed strongly following the West Chester run. Kutztown scored the game's next nine points as part of a 14-1 run to cut its deficit to 60-50 with 14:32 to play. Three minutes later (11:20), Kutztown's
Ryan Connolly (Harleysville, Pa./Souderton Area) drained a three-pointer to bring the game to single-digits (64-56), and was followed by a pair of
Austin Ford (Blue Bell, PA/Sanford School) free throws. Even though Kutztown trailed by just six points with 8:54 to play (68-62), West Chester scored the next eight points to lead 76-62 and take the game out of reach for Kutztown.
"Our guys worked hard on defense to bring the game to six points, but we had some bad turnovers that took us out of the game," head coach
Bernie Driscoll said. "At halftime, we talked about a plan to get the game to single-digits, and that is exactly what we did. We were able to take it from nine, down to six, but all of a sudden, a couple of turnovers brought it back to a 12-point game."
Four players scored in double figures for the Golden Bears. Freshman point guard
Austin Beidelman (Schnecksville, Pa./Parkland) scored a season-high 16 points including a 4-for-5 performance at the free throw line. Senior
Tyler Brooks (Douglassville, Pa./Daniel Boone) finished with 14 points in 28 minutes after leaving midway through the second half with an injury.
Josh Johnson (Norristown, Pa./Norristown) continued his hot start to the season with 13 points on 6-of-9 shooting. He has scored in double figures in each of his first six games, the first KU freshman to do so since Kevin Handy did so in each of his first seven in the 1999-2000 season.
Connolly went 5-for-5 at the free throw line and ended the game with 10 points. Free throw shooting was critical in the latter stage of the game, as the two teams combined for 70 free throw attempts and 52 personal fouls. West Chester shot 28-for-36, and Kutztown shot 23-of-34.
West Chester has now won four of the last five meetings against Kutztown, and was led Saturday by Shannon Givens' 22 points with five three-pointers. Matt Wisely was a bully under the boards and grabbed 15 rebounds, 10 of which were on the offensive end. West Chester's 16 offensive rebounds led to 17 second-chance points.
The bench play of West Chester was far superior to that of Kutztown's, outscoring it 32-10. Its successful first half was built on 45.5 percent shooting from the field, and 53.8 percent from beyond the arc. Kutztown's defense stepped up in the second half though and made some significant stops that helped mount its late run.
The Golden Bears take the next week off for finals before returning to the court with a pair of PSAC Crossover games on back-to-back nights. They travel to Clarion on Tuesday, Dec. 17, and Pitt-Johnstown on Wednesday, Dec. 18. Both tipoffs are set for 7:30 p.m.
