DeAndre Richardson had seven points and two assists in 15 minutes of play against Capital this afternoon.
Box Score
John Carroll and Capital matched-up for the first time since last year's 2007 OAC Tournament championship game, and the final result was the same although achieved in a different manner.
Bolstered by a hot shooting first half, the Crusaders rolled to their sixth consecutive win by downing a cold shooting Blue Streaks team, 87-72, in Saturday's OAC competition in University Heights.
Capital, which defeated John Carroll by a 78-73 score in last year's conference tournament final, was a blistering 19-32 (.594) in the first half compared to a 12-38 (.316) effort by John Carroll in the decisive first half.
When John Carroll's Terry Walsh made a three-pointer with just over ten minutes left in the first half, he gave John Carroll a 21-19 lead.
Capital quicky gained back the momentum by scoring 15 of the next 17 points to take a 34-23 with 6:16 to play int he opening period. The Crusaders were 6-7 from the field in that run, which included three three-pointers by Nate Stahl.
JCU would trim the Capital lead to 36-30 on a Jason Thompson Lay-up with 2:32 left on the clock. By the end of the first half, however, the Crusaders had re-established a double digit lead at 43-32.
The Blue Streaks briefly took the deficit down to single digits in the first few minutes of the second half. A Tony DeMichele lay-up with 17:18 showing on the clock cut the Crusaders' lead to 45-36, but back-to-back scores by Ryan Wood -- one of which was a three-pointer -- would put Capital's advantage into double figures were it remained the rest of the way.John Carroll (3-3, 1-1 OAC), which dropped its second home game of the year after losing just once at home all of last season, got a game-high 23 points From Walsh and 13 from Rudy Kirbus. The Blue Streaks hung right with the top rebounding team in the OAC (45-43 advantage for Capital), but never heated up their shooting touch. JCU ended the day 25-72 (.347) from the field and 4-18 (.222) from three-point range.
Ross Niekamp led #15 ranked Capital (7-1, 2-0 OAC) with his team-high 21 points and 10 rebounds. Stahl also chipped in with 14 points while D. J. Frazier and Quintin Mitchell each contributed ten points. The crusaders finished the game 33-63 (.524) from the field, including 7-20 (.350) from three-piont range.
JCU's bench, for the first time all season, outscored the starters (37-35).
