Creighton University
Wichita State
Shockers Too Much For Men's Basketball, 70-58
1/9/2010 4:00:00 PM | Men's Basketball
WICHITA, Kan. -- Wichita State scored the first eight points of the game and never trailed while posting a 70-58 victory over visiting Creighton on Saturday afternoon at sold-out Charles Koch Arena.
Wichita State is now 15-2 on the season and 4-1 in MVC play. The Shockers are also 11-0 at home this winter. Creighton saw its two-game win streak snapped and fell to 7-9 on the year (2-3 MVC).
Wichita State stormed to an 8-0 lead to start the game and were up 11-1 before Kenny Lawson Jr. dunked home CU's first field goal at the 16:02 mark. The Shockers led 13-3 at the first media timeout and maintained that lead at the second media timeout, still leading 20-10.
Clevin Hannah buried a corner three-pointer and Toure' Murry tip-dunked a Graham Hatch miss to give WSU its largest lead of the first half at 34-17 with 3:42 left in the period. Creighton scored the next five points and find themselves down just 12 points at the break, 40-28. Hatch and Durley each scored nine points in the opening 20 minutes for WSU, while CU was paced by seven from Kenny Lawson Jr. despite the big man's 2-for-8 shooting from the floor.
The Jays closed within 10 points when Lawson scored the first bucket of the second half to trim the deficit to 40-30, but CU would get no closer on this day.
The Jays hung around and were down 60-46 as the eight minute-mark approached when P'Allen Stinnett was called for palming and then issued a technical foul for disputing the call. WSU's Hannah, the national leader in free-throw percentage at 95.2 percent, would sink both foul shots for his 29th and 30th consecutive makes from the line.
Creighton trailed just 64-52 with 3:49 to go and got within 11 at 66-55 on an Ethan Wragge trey. A chance to cut it to single-digits went by the wayside when Antoine Young missed the front-end of a bonus situation, and Hatch delivered the dagger with a three-pointer as the shot clock expired to put the Shockers up 69-55 with 1:52 left.
Lawson led CU with 15 points and added a team-best six rebounds, while Young tied a season-high with 10 points. Creighton shot 40.4 percent from the field and 58.8 percent from the line, but made just 2-of-11 shots from three-point range on the afternoon. One bright spot for CU was its rebounding as the Jays beat the Shockers on the glass by a 34-33 margin, just the second team to out-board WSU all season.
WSU had four players in double-figures, led by 17 points from Hatch and 15 points from Gabe Blair. Durley and Hannah each scored 11 for the Shockers. Toure' Murry had eight points, seven assists and five rebounds as well. The Shockers made 24-of-53 from the field (45.3 percent) and also hit 15-of-17 from the line (88.2 percent).
Creighton returns home on Wednesday when it hosts Southern Illinois in an 8 pm start. The game will be televised by Fox Sports Net and can be heard on radio on KXSP (Big Sports 590 AM).
NOTES: P'Allen Stinnett had six points and now has 987 in his career ...Dana Altman is now 2-6 in his career against Wichita State when the Shockers score 70 or more points, compared to a 27-2 mark when holding WSU to 69 or less points ...Altman also falls to 21-4 all-time vs. WSU in games decided by 12 points or less ...Justin Carter tied a career-high with two blocked shots, done three times previously ...Antoine Young's 10 points tied a season-best.
