Marauders hold off Lake Erie for 73-68 victory

WILBERFORCE, Ohio – The Central State Marauders built a 17-point halftime lead and held on for a 73-68 victory over the Lake Erie Storm on Saturday.

CSU picked up its first win of the season and is now 1-3 entering the Thanksgiving break. Lake Erie dropped to 2-2 overall.

Both offenses struggled to score in the opening minutes before Lake Erie built a lead of 14-8 after a Ryan Middendorf three-pointer at the 10:58 mark. Davone Daniels gave the Marauder offense a jumpstart off the bench with 7 quick points as CSU outscored LEC, 28-6, to take a 36-21 lead at intermission.

Lake Erie cut the deficit down to 6 midway through the second stanza but CSU answered right back as Daniels hit back-to-back shots from beyond the arc as his team upped their lead to 14 with 5:39 to play. Lake Erie refused to go away as the Storm hit their next four shots from the field. A Harrison Riggs three ball brought Lake Erie with 3 with 2:08 left to play. Baskets from Oliver Martin and Chris Scott put CSU back up by 7 with 47 seconds left. The Storm pulled back within three with a free throw and three-pointer from Riggs. With 10 seconds to go, the Storm sent Daniels to the line. The senior guard from Indianapolis, Indiana calmly knocked down both free throws for his 20^th and 21^st point of the night, clinching the game for his team.

Daniels led a CSU bench that outscored the Lake Erie reserves, 43-28.

On his way to a game-high 21 points, Daniels converted 7 of 11 shots and was a perfect 4 for 4 from the free throw line.

Oliver scored 15 points. Scott recorded his second double-double of the season with 10 points and 11 rebounds.

Lake Erie was paced by Middendorf's 14 points.

CSU will begin SIAC play next Saturday when they host Albany State at 3 pm.


Head Coach Joseph Price - Quotes
"Led by Davone, our bench gave us the edge in tonight's win. I also thought Chris Cook and Terrence Gholson gave us some good minutes tonight on both ends of the floor. I am proud of the way our reserves stepped up and delivered at key moments in the game."

"We had some players finally step up in big moments tonight and we need them to maintain a high level of consistency as we go into conference play."

"Lake Erie is a very good team. We had our opportunities to take full control of the game but they kept finding ways to get back into the game and they really made our guys work for tonight's win."

"We will review the game film and focus on finding ways to more intensity to start the game and playing smarter at the end of the game. Tonight's game against a quality opponent will really make us better moving forward."
 
 
Notes
CSU played the game without last year's top scorer in Dwight Richards, Jr. and top rebounder Jeremy Brown. Both players are expected back after the holiday break.

Daniels scored a season-high 21 points on Saturday.

Daniels transferred to CSU for his senior season. He previously played at St. Joseph's College (IN).

CSU played a G-MAC opponent for the second consecutive game (Malone & Lake Erie).
 
 
 
Next Game
Opponent: Albany State
Date: Saturday, November 25
Tip-Off: 3 pm
Location: Beacom/Lewis Gymnasium – Wilberforce, Ohio

Coverage
Radio -  Gem City Sports Network (http://www.gemcitysports.com/radio-1/)
Video -  CSU Sports Streaming Channel (http://maraudersports.com/watch/)
Radio - Arena Sports Network (http://arenasportsnet.com/live/)
Live Stats -  Marauder Live Stats site (http://www.sidearmstats.com/centralstate/wbball/)
 
Tickets
For ticket information, visit -  http://centralstate.universitytickets.com/user_pages/event_listings.asp