The Ashland men’s university basketball team used their scorching hot shooting and defensive prowess to rout the Purdue Northwest Pride, 95-52, on Saturday (Feb. 17) in conference play on the road.

With the win, the Eagles improved their record to 17-9 for the season and 10-8 in GLIAC play. The loss dropped the Pride’s record to 2-24 overall while being 2-16 in the conference.

It was a night filled with milestones for Ashland as the win was the largest margin of victory in head coach John Ellenwood’s tenure. Junior guard Ben Haraway also ended up reaching 1,000 collegiate career points during the game.

AU and Purdue Northwest traded blows early in the first half before the Eagles turned up their defensive pressure and began to pull away for the rest of the half with a 27-3 run. Ashland gave up just one field goal during this stretch.

Everything was clicking offensively for Ashland as they were able to jump out to a comfortable 44-23 lead going into halftime off a buzzer beating 3-pointer from freshman guard Aaron Thompson. Thompson finished the game with a career high 14 points.

The Pride tried to work their way back into the game throughout the second half, but the established lead was too much to overcome as the Eagles continued to go on a tear offensively.

AU finished the game shooting the lights out, hitting 34-of-57 (59.6 percent) field goals while also draining 14-of-28 (50 percent) threes. On the other hand, Purdue Northwest finished the game only shooting 30.2 percent from the floor while going 28.6 percent from deep.

The Eagles dominated on the inside as they outrebounded the Pride 42-30 while also scoring 34 points in the paint.
Senior forward Wendell Davis led the Eagles with 20 points and four rebounds on 6-for-10 shooting. Davis hit three triples for the game.

Haraway finished the game with 19 points, three rebounds, three assists and two steals while also hitting three triples.
Sophomore center Drew Noble chipped in 11 points and collected a team high eight rebounds. Senior forward Marsalis Hamilton had a team best five assists.

Freshman guard Joey Zahn nailed five 3-pointers for the game on 55 percent shooting from deep off the bench to chip in 15 points for the Eagles.

The Eagles will begin to close out their regular season back at Kates Gymnasium, taking on the Saginaw Valley State Cardinals (5-20, 5-13 in GLIAC) on Thursday (Feb. 22). Tip off is scheduled for 7:30 p.m.