Courtesy of SaintPetersPeacocks.com
JERSEY CITY, NJ – Senior forward Quadir Welton (Philadelphia, PA/Math, Civics and Science Charter) scored a career-high 27-points, to power Saint Peter’s men’s basketball to an 80-67 victory over Boston University on Monday night. The win is the second in a row for the Peacocks as they improve to 3-2 on the season, with all three wins coming by double-digits. Senior guard Trevis Wyche (Neptune, NJ/Saint Peter’s Prep) added 16 points, and Antwon Portley (Lancaster, TX/Lancaster) scored 12 points all in the second half in the victory.
“Good, hard fought win,” said head coach John Dunne. “I thought we had a great energy about us the last seven or eights minutes, where throughout the course of the game we were giving them easy layups and easy baskets. We had confidence on the offensive end, which was really important, but we came up with some really big defensive stops and some steals in a stretch where that was really important.”
The Terriers jumped out to an early 7-0 lead over the Peacocks on three straight layups including a three-point play on the third possession. The Peacocks quickly responded, scoring seven straight points all by Welton, to knot the game at 7-7. From that point on, the game was back and forth with ties at 9-9, 11-11 after a rim-shaking dunk by Welton, and 16-16 after a three-ball by Nick Griffin (Rockville, MD/Col. Zadok Magruder (George Washington)). Griffin added another deep three pointer, giving him back-to-back treys, propelling the Peacocks to its first lead of the game, at 19-16 with just under 12 minutes in the half. A three point shot by Wyche would extend a Peacocks run to 17-5, leading to the largest Peacock lead of the half at 11 points, with the scoreboard reading 30-19. The Terriers did manage to close out the half on a 12-4 run of their own, cutting into the Peacock advantage at 35-31. Welton dropped 16 of his 27 points in the first, while Griffin and Chazz Patterson (Browns Mills, NJ/Trenton Catholic) added six points each. The Peacocks scored seven second chance points off of five offensive rebounds in the first 20 as well.
The Peacocks opened the second half scoring the first six points, including Portley hitting a three ball for his first basket that helped push the lead back to double digits at 41-31. Portley wasn’t finished as he caught fire adding two more threes on back-to-back possessions, making the score 49-40. Boston stuck around, cutting back into the Peacock lead and with the score at 53-47, Cavon Baker (Queens, NY/New Hope Academy [Md.) (Houston)), got on the box score, hitting a 15-foot jumper, and adding two made free throws for five straight points, extending the lead to 56-47. Six straight points by the Terriers, again cut it back to three but that would be the closest they would get for the remainder of the night as the Peacocks offense responded with a couple of made charity stripe shots by Wyche and another three by Portley giving him four in the half on 4-for-4 shooting. Eight straight points by Wyche on two made layups and four more free throws gave the home team a 75-59 edge, its largest of the game at the time, at 16 points with 2:50 left. One more monster slam by Welton with just under one minute remaining and a steal and layup by Patterson extended the Peacock lead to 17, with 42 ticks and a commanding 80-63 lead.
“Obviously Quadir was a force in the middle, he had the great start to the game which gave us a lot confidence after we spotted them some points and then Nick Griffin made some big shots and Chazz Patterson made a three or two in the first half. It kept us around and we had the lead at halftime and just felt really confident. In the second half, Trevis had an unbelievable rest there from foul trouble in the first half and then he reminded me of the All-MAAC player that he was last year, in the second half today, taking the game over and playing with a lot of confidence. Portley had a nice half for us. He was struggling a little bit and it was nice to see him hit his first one, then he got confidence and once he made that first one in the second half, then he kind of knew that he was going to make shots.”
The Peacocks finished the night forcing the Terriers into 18 turnovers, converting those change of possessions into 23 points. Despite allowing Boston to shoot 50 percent from the field (27-of-54) the Peacocks held the Terriers, who came into Jersey City averaging 84.2 points per game (ranked 44th nationally in scoring), to just 67 points, their second lowest output of the season. The Peacocks defense remains at the top of the MAAC and one of the best on the country as the they entered the night ranked 61st in the country.
The Peacocks improve to 3-2 on the young season and head into MAAC play on a two-game winning streak. The team will be back on the hardwood, hosting Iona on Friday, December 2, at 7:00pm in the Yanitelli Center.
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