Velasquez carries road-weary Cavs over MSU Northern

11/10/2014 10:39:00 PM

PORTLAND, Ore.—With four players scoring in double figures, including a team-high 25 from senior guard Tyler Velasquez (Colorado Springs, Colo./Doherty H.S.), the Concordia University men's basketball team improved to 5-0 on the season with an 81-73 win over Montana State Northern on Monday night.

The win for Concordia was its third in the last four days, and fourth in less than a week, as the team returned home from a two-game sweep at Alaska Anchorage on Sunday.

The five-win start is the first for the team in five years as the 2009-10 club opened the year with a program-record nine straight wins.

Concordia will next take the floor on Friday, Nov. 14 when it plays an exhibition match at NCAA DI University of Portland. Opening tip against the Pilots is set for 7:05 p.m. inside the Chiles Center. A day later, the Cavs will put its undefeated start to a test at New Hope Christian College in Eugene, Ore.

On Monday, MSUM (6-2) managed minimal leads in the first half against the N. 25-ranked Cavaliers, going up 4-2 behind early points by Corbin Pearson and 10-8 on a layup by Damien Robinson.

The Skylights held the lead for just over three minutes in the opening half as the Cavaliers used a 15-6 spark near the final minutes of the half to carry a 40-29 lead into the break.

A Warren Edmonson 3-pointer with 16:03 left in the second brought the Skylights back to within a single point (46-45), but Concordia continued to produce efficient shots on the offensive end to outlast the MSUM momentum.

After firing at a 53.8 percent rate in the first half, Concordia connected on 54.7 percent of its attempts in the second half to generate as much as a 13-point advantage.

Velasquez did the heavy lifting in the first half with 18 of his 25 points before the break wile Anthony Holton (Portland, Ore./Sunset H.S.) and Kory Kirwan (Hillsboro, Ore./Glencoe H.S.) scored nine points each in the second half as part of a balanced attack for the Cavs.

Center Justyn Searle (Salt Lake City, Utah/Kearns H.S.) finished second on the team with 13 points, followed by Holton (12) and Davis Nuaimi (Fontana, Calif./Etiwanda H.S.) (11).

MSU Northern received a spectacular outing from its senior forward Pearson, who was nearly perfect from the floor en route to a game-high 30 points. Pearson hit 13 of 14 from the field and 3 of 6 from the free throw line. Pearson also grabbed a game-high nine rebounds in the losing effort.