Final Stats
Postgame: Shepherd | West Liberty
CHARLESTON, W.Va. – Top-seeded and No. 4 ranked West Liberty grabbed the lead four seconds into its Mountain East Conference Basketball Tournament quarterfinal round game with eighth-seeded Shepherd here Friday evening at the Charleston Civic Center and never looked back en route to an 89-75 victory.
The win, the 12th in a row for the Hilltoppers, improved them to 26-2 and earns them a berth in Saturday's semifinals at 6 p.m.
The Hilltoppers' relentless pressure defense forced 10 early Ram turnovers and helped aid in West Liberty building a 23-8 advantage 10 minutes into the game.
“I thought we really came out of the blocks well to start the game at both ends of the court,” said West Liberty coach Jim Crutchfield. “Defensively I thought our pressure was good and that we had a good level of intensity.
“I thought we started the second half really well too and got a comfortable lead. To Shepherd's credit there was a couple of times when I thought they were going to go away and they didn't. They hung in there. They were down 17, but I thought they did a good job of fighting back. They cut it back to nine in the first half and then had it down to six early in the second half, but it was right then that I think we probably played our best stretch of basketball.”
After Shepherd's Ryan McTavish buried a 3-pointer to make it 43-37 early in the final half West Liberty responded with 22-9 run over the course of the next 6:21 to essentially end any doubt as to the game's outcome. The Hilltoppers, who made just one 3-point field goal in the opening half, drained five during that spurt.
“I have so much respect for coach Crutchfield, his program and what they do,” said Shepherd coach Justin Namolik. “They're very aggressive, physical and they shoot the ball very well. They're an extremely tough team to beat. For us to beat them it would almost take a perfect game.
“It took us the first 10 minutes to get settled down and play. We were rattled. We got pushed around early, but then I thought we pushed back and I'm proud of our guys for that.
“Then at the beginning of the second half they hit some threes which hurt us. I thought we did a good job guarding against the threes in the first half, but they hurt us with them during that early run in the second half.”
West Liberty's lead ballooned to as many as 25 before Shepherd made a late surge to make it respectable.
The Hilltoppers shot 49.2 percent from the field in the win (31-of-63), including a 7-of-15 showing from long range (46.7 percent). West Liberty also scored 44 points in the paint in the victory.
“We do what we do and we do it every night,” said West Liberty's Seger Bonifant, the MEC's Player of the Year who led his team with a game-high 24 points on a 7-of-9 shooting performance from the field and an 8-of-8 showing at the foul line. “We play hard, play together and have fun.”
West Liberty also got 19 points and 13 rebounds from C.J. Hester, 11 points from Zac Grossenbacher and 10 points from Joe Lococo. Hester's double-double outing was his team-high eighth of the season.
Shepherd, which finished the season with a 15-15 record, was led by senior Austin Cunningham's 16 points.
“All season long we've had a motto on the team which is find a purpose,” said Cunningham. “When we got down early we just tried to remember that. We just kept chipping and fighting to get ourselves back in it.”
The Rams, who lost their 19th straight game to West Liberty dating back to 2006, also got 15 points from Naim Muhammad, 11 points from McTavish and four points and a game-high 14 rebounds from Morgan McDonald.