Men's Basketball Stays Hot In Cold Temperatures

Belmont Vision Multimedia. (Zach Watkins)

Despite rain, snow, sleet and hail, the Bruins delivered a win in front of over 700 people who braved the winter storm for some Missouri Valley Conference basketball. 

With its 80-69 victory over Illinois State, Belmont improved to 8-2 in MVC play and tied Murray State atop the conference standings. 

“This win says a lot about our team and our competitiveness. I think both teams are really good. If we started over, it might go the other way,” said Bruins’ head coach Casey Alexander. 

The game was rescheduled from Sunday to Saturday in response to the weather. In addition, the women's basketball team had its game postponed from Saturday to Monday night. 

Moving a game around inclement weather is no small task, and Alexander wanted to make sure everyone who made it possible got the recognition they deserved. 

“It’s important to thank everybody who made it happen, including Illinois State, who came a day early. That was sacrificial on their part,” Alexander said. “But we had a lot of Belmont employees, outside employees that were here and we had a pretty good crowd as it turned out.” 

Although the weather impacted the crowd size and the game’s start time, it did not appear to affect the Bruins. 

Belmont rode an early 10-0 run in the first half to a 44-36 lead heading into the break. 

The Bruins trailed for all of 13 seconds in a first half where they shot 58% from the floor and connected on their first five three-pointers. 

Nevertheless, the game was far from over. That is because Illinois State had the reigning MVC Player of the Week, junior Chase Walker. 

“He’s the unicorn in the league. Like he’s the one guy that’s different than everybody else that you play,” Alexander said. 

Illinois State thawed out in the second half and outscored Belmont 15-4 over the first five minutes, while seizing a three-point lead. 

Despite leading by as much as 14 points in the first half, the Bruins had squandered a first-half lead for the third straight game. 

However, like the previous two games, they dug themselves out of their own hole. 

After Illinois State pushed the lead to four, junior Brigham Rogers hit a layup to ignite a 14-2 Belmont run that swung momentum back to the Bruins.  

That run featured a left-handed tomahawk dunk from redshirt sophomore Drew Scharnowski to tie the game at 58, and back-to-back threes from redshirt freshman Eoin Dillon to bring the lead out to eight points. 

Dillon, who led all scorers with 16 points, poured in 11 points in just eight minutes to open the second half.  

“He’s pretty clutch for a freshman, but that’s who he is. He’s just got a little swagger about him, he wants to be in those moments and he has delivered many times,” said Alexander.  

From that point on, Belmont was able to cruise to an 11-point victory while never leading by less than five. 

The Bruins won behind a balanced offensive attack. Three players scored in double figures, seven had at least seven points and the team's bench outscored Illinois State's bench 31-12.  

Additionally, the Bruins were able to hold Walker to 12 points and kept him from filling up the stat sheet offensively. 

“I thought we handled him pretty well. It’s a balance; you try to battle him, but you also try not to let him create offense for everybody else,” Alexander said. “In the first half, we gave up some threes because we were too worried about him. In the second half, we were a little more complete.” 

Junior Isaiah West had a big day, scoring eight points on 3-4 shooting while adding eight assists, shattering his previous career-high of three.  

The Bruins outscored Illinois State by 16 points when West was on the court and were outscored by five when he sat.  

Belmont shot better than 50% from the field and from three-point range for the fifth time this season, and its 56% shooting from distance was a new season-high. 

The Bruins travel on Wednesday to take on the Valparaiso Beacons for the second time in two weeks, before a head-to-head matchup against Murray State to decide the top seed in the MVC next Saturday at home. 

This article was written by Sam Dicus