Lewis Athletics
Luke Rinne
ROMEOVILLE – Lewis University’s men’s basketball team got back to the .500 mark with a 77-65 win over William Jewell on Thursday evening at Neil Carey Arena. Beau Frericks (Cary, Ill./Cary Grove)matched his career-high with 19 points and five made three-pointers to lead the Flyers (8-8 overall and GLVC).
The game went back-and-forth over the first 15 minutes before Lewis seized control with a 13-2 run over the final five minutes of the half to take a 36-28 lead into the locker room at the intermission. Marquise Jackson (Macon, Ga./Windsor Academy) capped the run hitting a layup as the shot clock expired right before the end of the first half off a pass from Austin Boucher (Fort Wayne, Ind./Fort Wayne North Side).
Frericks, Bruno Williams (Milwaukee, Wis./Wisconsin Lutheran) and Vlado Zrnic (Greendale, Wis./Greendale) each had three points in that run while Atakan Sahinkaya (Istanbul, Turkey/Perkiomen School) and Marquise Jackson (Macon, Ga./Windsor Academy) added two points apiece.
The Flyers extended their lead to 10 on the first possession of the second half as Frericks hit a pull-up jumper at the foul line.
The Cardinals (3-14 overall and GLVC) fought back to within 39-35 after a basket from Mason Alexander with 17:44 remaining. Lewis pushed its lead back to seven but WJC continued to hang around and were down four with less than 14 minutes to play.
The Flyers led 51-45 after a layup from Eysan Wiley with 11:28 before pulling away with an 11-0 run to extend its lead to their largest of the game at 62-45 with 9:08 to go. Williams, Jackson and Boucher each had three points in the run while Sahinkaya had a monster dunk to seal the run.
The Cardinals came right back with nine straight points to cut the lead to 62-54 on a layup from Wiley with 6:20 to play but Lewis countered scoring nine of the next 11 points to push its lead back to double figures.
William Jewell made one last gasp cutting the Flyer lead to five with 0:44 to play on a jumper from Alexander but Lewis closed it out going 4-for-4 at the charity stripe in the final 0:35 to grab the victory.
The Flyers shot 47.5 percent (28-for-59) from the floor, were 8-of-20 from three and shot 73 percent at the foul line. They outrebounded the Cardinals 37-27 and their bench outscored Jewell’s bench 34-2 in the contest. Trevian Bell (Joliet, Ill./Joliet West) added nine points while Williams, Zrnic and Sahinkaya had eight points each and Jackson finished with seven points.
William Jewell was led in scoring by Wiley who finished with a game-high 23 points and he was joined in double figures by Jordan Jermain with 18 points and Alexander added 11 points. The Cardinals shot 48.1 percent (26-for-54) from the field in the contest, were 7-of-23 from three and shot 54 percent at the foul line.
Lewis is back at home on Saturday hosting Rockhurst at 3 p.m.