by By Michael Pierce | @mepierce01, ERAU Athletics
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Saturday night’s matchup between a pair of top-25 teams was billed as the NAIA II Men’s Basketball Game of the Week, but the second-ranked Embry-Riddle Eagles didn’t care much about making it a competitive affair. The Blue and Gold ran out to an early lead and never looked back, winning by a score of 82-63. ERAU improves to 23-1 overall and 11-1 in Sun Conference games, while WU drops to 16-7, 6-7 in the league.
Four Eagles scored 14 or more points, led by Joseph Gonzalez‘s 17 on 5-of-6 shooting. Dalton Barnes, DeForest Carter (Seminole Tribe of Florida) and Cesar Pastrana each added 14, with Pastrana adding a game-high eight rebounds and Carter and Barnes each grabbing five boards. Carter also picked up three steals, bringing his season total to 88, which breaks Tom Fagley’s single-season record of 86 steals set in 1990-91. Reed Ridder led all players with five assists to go along with six points.
Eddie Delegal led the Royals with a game-high 21 points and pulled down a team-leading seven caroms, while Warrner Hall tallied 14 points and four rebounds.
ERAU got off to a strong start, jumping out to a 10-4 lead just over three minutes into the game. It took the Eagles a little while to extend the margin, but by the 11:07 mark they had pushed it up to 10 points (24-14).
The Blue and Gold really hit its stride in the latter stages of the first period, using a 12-1 run to build the lead up to 19 points (41-22) with 3:20 to play in the half. Embry-Riddle would hold a comfortable 43-26 advantage going into halftime.
The Eagles didn’t let up coming out of the locker room as Daniel Kiesling drilled a three on the opening possession of the second half, increasing ERAU’s lead to 46-26. Ridder knocked down a triple on the next Eagle possession to make it a 49-28 contest with 18:36 to play.
Warner bounced back with an 8-0 run to cut the lead to 13 (49-36), and with 13:23 remaining, the Royals had worked to trim the deficit to just 10 points (53-43). The Blue and Gold withstood the charge and responded, pushing the margin up to 19 on a fast-break dunk from Gonzalez with just over 10 minutes remaining that made it a 64-45 game.
The Royals couldn’t muster a counterpunch and by the 4:36 mark the Eagles held a commanding 23-point lead, 74-51. From there, ERAU would cruise to an 82-63 victory to pick up its sixth consecutive win.
Embry-Riddle connected on over half its field goals (27-of-51, 52.9%) and made 20-of-22 free throw attempts. The Blue and Gold were dominant on the glass, outrebounding Warner 36-20; 10 of the Eagles’ rebounds were offensive, leading to 16 second chance points against just four for the Royals.
The Eagles hit the road for a conference showdown at Northwood on Tuesday, Feb. 10. Tip-off is scheduled for 7 p.m.
