The win improved the Cardinals to 28-2 overall and earns them a berth inSaturday's semifinals at 8:15 p.m. Wesleyan ended its season at 17-13.

Junior forward Kyle Ritz set the tone for the Cardinals early scoring 15 of his game-high 19 points in the first half as Wheeling opened a 37-19 advantage at the break.

“The biggest difference in the game was the first five minutes,” Wesleyan coach Gary Nottingham said. “They punched us in the face and we didn't respond. That set the tone. It was like 12-0 in the first five minutes and we ended up losing by 16 so that 12-point spurt there early really made a big difference.”

The Cardinals quickly upped the lead to 21 early in the final half before Wesleyan put together a couple of runs which got the Bobcats back within 12 at the 12:43mark and to within 13 with 9:31 to go. Wesleyan, which was held to just 14 field goals for the game and got outscored in the paint by the Cardinals, 46-10, would never get any closer.

“We were ready to play today and anxious to play,” WJU head coach Danny Sancomb said. “We had a bad taste in our mouths from our last game (an 82-74 loss to West Liberty in the season finale for both schools). Sometimes after a game like that teams will put their heads down and lose a little confidence. We're light years away from that. Our guys were very disappointed in our performance and we wanted to play.

“I thought we did a very good job of attacking them off of the drive and scoring in the paint and when we didn't score we got offensive rebounds and converted off of those. It was a good win for us, but we know Saturday we're going to have to play a lot better.”

Wheeling also got its 13th double-double performance of the season from sophomore forward Haywood Highsmith, who finished with 16 points and a game-high 13 rebounds. Pat Moseh added 11 points and eight rebounds for the Cardinals.

Wesleyan senior center Tanner McGrew wrapped up his collegiate career with his MEC-leading 19th double-double outing of the year. He led the Bobcats with 12 points and 11 rebounds. The only other Wesleyan player to reach double figures in scoring was Fred Brondsted, who finished with 10 points.
 



#6 Notre Dame 79, #3 Fairmont State 78 | Final Stats
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Notre Dame leaned on its scrappy style of play, resolve and a 55-percent foul shooter to pull off the biggest upset of the Mountain East Conference tournament on Thursday, earning a 79-78 stunner against Fairmont State in the quarterfinals at the Charleston Civic Center.

The victory sends coach Tim Koenig’s Falcons (18-10) to Friday’s semifinals against second-seeded Wheeling Jesuit (28-2), a 67-51 victor against West Virginia Wesleyan in Thursday’s first quarterfinal contest.

“Fairmont State is good enough to win the national title,” said Koenig, whose team dropped two regular-season games to Fairmont by an average of 21 points this season. “These guys (Will Vorhees and Tyree Gaiter) led the way, but it was a big-time team effort.”

Koenig didn’t need to mention Taylor, although his 20-point, nine-rebound effort was a crucial component to Notre Dame’s first-ever win over Fairmont State (28-4) – the fifth-ranked team in the National Association of Basketball Coaches’ Poll.

Taylor, shooting 55 percent from the foul line (29-52), sandwiched a pair of free throws around Fairmont State’s final timeout with 6.5 seconds left to give Notre Dame the victory.

Following the second free throw, the ball was inbounded to 5-foot-7 freshman guard Jason Jolly, who went the length of the floor for a layup that was blocked and rebounded by 6-8 Ja’Sean Lewis as the clock expired.

Notre Dame will likely need two more upsets leading to an MEC tournament title to play in the NCAA Division II Atlantic Region. Fairmont State is assured of continuing its postseason, but lost a chance to have the tourney played at Joe Retton Arena, a disappointing fact for coach Jerrod Calhoun.

“We didn’t go as hard leading up to this tournament,” said Calhoun, whose team has lost in the tournament quarterfinals for the third consecutive year. “We let a great opportunity pass us up. This team has underachieved. I thought we would come out with more fire.”

Vorhees had 21 points to lead Notre Dame, while Gaiter and Taylor had 20 apiece. Lewis’ final rebound that sealed the deal was his game-high 18th. Notre Dame won on the boards 43-37 and had 17 assists to just 11 for Fairmont.

 

By Rich Stevens for MountainEast.org

West Liberty 73, Glenville State 71 | Final Stats
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- West Liberty men's basketball coach Jim Crutchfield said he has never used the term 'Survive and advance,' but decided there wasn't a more appropriate description for his team's Mountain East Conference tournament quarterfinal win over Glenville on Friday.
 

West Liberty owned 125-78 and 114-75 wins over coach Stephen Dye’s team in the regular season, but the Pioneers – playing the Hilltoppers in the MEC tournament for the third consecutive year – buckled down on the Civic Center floor.

“These guys, come tournament time, are ready to go,” said Dye, whose team upset its way to the title last year as the No. 5 seed. “I’m frustrated we didn’t bring this the whole year.”"

Following Hoehn's free throws to give West Liberty a three-point lead, Glenville's Sedric Nady was fouled at the other end prior to releasing a 3-point attempt with 3.1 seconds left. Nady hit the first free throw and missed the second intentionally. The ball came off the rim and wound up near the baseline and into the hands of forward Jalon Plummer, whose rushed putback went over the backboard as the buzzer sounded.

West Liberty senior Seger Bonifant, who was named last week as the MEC player of the year for the second consecutive year, finished with 32 points after scoring just four in the 2015 loss to Glenville.

Zac Grossenbacher had 17 points and 11 boards for the Hilltoppers.

Brett Morris finished with 27 points to lead Glenville while Nady had 23 and Plummer 15.
Hoehn added 12 for West Liberty, which will be seeking its first MEC Tournament title.
 


By Duane Cochran for MountainEast.org

Concord 75, Charleston 61 | Final Stats
CHARLESTON, W.Va. – Just over a week ago the University of Charleston handed Concord a 30-point shellacking in the next-to-last regular season contest of the year.

It was, by far, the Mountain Lions worst defeat of the season.

Friday evening in the quarterfinals of the Mountain East Conference Tournament at the Charleston Civic Center fourth-seeded Concord got a little payback on the very same floor when it eliminated fifth-seeded UC, 75-61.

The victory improved Concord to 20-9 overall and earned the Mountain Lions a spot in Saturday's semifinals against top-seeded West Liberty (27-2) at 6 p.m.

Charleston, meanwhile, ends its season with a 16-14 mark.

“They drilled us eight days ago and the way that they play, the way they defend and as hard as they play is a testament to the leadership they have,” Concord coach Kent McBride said. “As for us, I thought we played very well tonight. Shooting 50 percent against UC is a rarity. It doesn't happen very often. We didn't change anything from eight days ago when we played them and lost. It's just that these guys decided tonight to do it right. They locked in and executed what we wanted them to execute.”

Seniors Rob Reed and Terry Hopewell helped key the Mountain Lions' victory. Reed, a guard, finished with a game-high 24 points, 15 of which came in the second half when Concord began to establish itself offensively against the Golden Eagles and pull away.

Hopewell, CU's center, added 20 points and a team-high nine rebounds.

“I didn't play very good in that 30-point loss so it really motivated me tonight to come in here, play focused and do what I needed to do for us to win,” Hopewell said. “I knew I needed to get on the boards and score in the paint.”

Concord led 33-30 at the half but in the first 5:18 of the second half Hopewell and Reed combined to score 17 straight points for the Mountain Lions which helped them extend the margin to 50-38. UC rallied back and got within five at the 9:34 mark, but once again Concord had an answer and four minutes later had the lead up to 17.

“Congratulations to Concord,” UC head coach Dwaine Osborne said. “Kent does a great job of getting his team to compete and play hard and I thought they did that tonight.

“We struggled with making perimeter shots tonight which has been a bit of an Achilles' heel for us this year. We finished the regular season again, I think, for the second time in three years No. 1 in the league in field goal percentage defense, unfortunately tonight we struggled to guard them and that obviously made for a tough night for us.”

Concord shot 52.9 percent from the field in the win (27-of-51), including a hot 59.1 percent (13-of-22) in the second half.

The Mountain Lions also got 10 points and four rebounds from Jametrius Wade and eight points from Aaron Miller.

Tino Ditrapano led UC with 17 points. The senior guard, who is from Charleston, went over the 1,000-point mark for his career in the loss. He ends his UC career with 1,015 points.

The Golden Eagles also got 11 points and eight rebounds from Justin Coleman and eight points from Jaylen Hinton.