The Seattle University men’s basketball team used its solid defense along with an early offensive outburst to defeat the Bakersfield Roadrunners, 53-43, Saturday night in a Western Athletic Conference contest at KeyArena.
Isiah Umipig (Federal Way, Wash.) led all players with 16 points, including three three-pointer early in the first half, plus he pulled down five rebounds. Jadon Cohee (Langley, B.C.) collected 13 points off the bench, featuring key back-to-back three-pointers in the second half, while William Powell (Huntsville, Ala.) pulled down a team-high eight rebounds and Emerson Murray (Vancouver, B.C.) contributed four rebounds, two assists, and four steals.
“I thought our guys did an excellent job executing what they wanted to execute and force those guys to take shots they did not want to take,” Seattle U head coach Cameron Dollar said. “We did a yeoman’s effort on the boards against a team that is a really good rebounding squad. Finally, we made them commit uncharacteristic turnovers by being active defensively.”
Seattle U held Bakersfield without a field goal for over eight minutes to start the game, opening a 17-1 lead that featured all three of Umipig’s three-pointers during the game. Down 21-6 with 6:11 remaining in the first half, the Roadrunners cut into the Redhawk lead thanks to an 8-3 scoring run, including back-to-back three-pointers by Tyrell Corbin and Cortez Conners, but Seattle U still led at halftime, 24-14.
Bakersfield (13-17, 7-6 WAC) closed to within seven at 30-23 with 11:20 left in the second half on a three-pointer by Dashawn Richmond, but the Redhawks went on a 14-4 run over the next five minutes, including Cohee’s consecutive three-pointers, to open their biggest lead of the night at 44-27. The Roadrunners scored eight unanswered points later in the half, led by Kevin Mays with four points, to close to within eight at 46-38, but Seattle U made enough free throws in the final two minutes to finish off the victory.
Corbin led Bakersfield with 12 points, while Mays led the Roadrunners with 12 rebounds and five steals to go along with six points. Aly Ahmed, the team’s leading scorer coming into the game, was held to three points, all from the free throw line, but he did pull down eight rebounds and dish out two assists. As a team, the Roadrunners shot 26.9 percent (14-of-52) from the field, including 5-of-20 from behind the three-point line, and 71.4 percent (10-of-14) from the free throw line.
Seattle U shot 38.5 percent (15-of-39) from the field, including 6-of-17 from behind the three-point line, and 51.5 percent (17-of-33) from the free throw line. Each team pulled down 34 rebounds and committed 14 turnovers, but the Redhawks were able to hold off the Bakersfield offense after taking their significant lead in the first half.
The victory closes out a 6-1 conference home record for Seattle U, the program’s best home mark in league play since joining the WAC. The Redhawks have clinched no worse than the fourth seed in the upcoming WAC Tournament, the team’s highest seed in its three years of participating in the postseason tournament.
Seattle University (14-13, 7-6 WAC) will look to clinch its first winning season since 2009-10 when it heads to Phoenix, Ariz., to face Grand Canyon next Saturday, March 7, starting at 7 p.m. local time (6 p.m. Pacific time). The game will be broadcast on 770 AM KTTH, with Dave Grosby and Gary Hill Jr. providing the play-by-play descriptions, starting with the pregame show shortly before tipoff.