BUCKHANNON, W.Va. — Jeremiah Moore shattered his previous season-high of 30 and came just two points shy of matching his career-high, helping lead the Yellow Jackets to a 93-86 road-win against the West Virginia Wesleyan Bobcats on Saturday night.
The Yellow Jackets improve to 18-6 on the season, 13-4 in Mountain East action. The Bobcats fall to 2-22 on the season, 1-17 in conference play.
Moore turned in 39 points on the back of 15 of 18 shooting and 9 of 10 at the charity stripe. He also gathered seven rebounds. Glen Abram added 19 points, hitting 5 of 12 long-range shots. Anthony Pittman and Dwayne Jones also turned in double-digit performances, scoring 12 and 10 points respectively.
The Jackets overall shot 33 of 61 from the field and 20 of 22 from the free throw line. Abram, Jones, Noah Jordan, and Ernest Jenkins all went 2 for 2 from the charity stripe.
Scoring was sparse between the two teams for the first two minutes, with only a Jeremiah Moore free throw and an Anthony Pittman trey scored. Wesleyan answered with two quick treys to take a 6-4 lead. Moore hit two quick layups forcing the Bobcats to use their use it or lose timeout at the 15:20 mark of the first half. WVSU went on a mini 7-3 run to extend the lead to six points. The Bobcats clawed their way back to come to within one when Noah Jordan hit a layup to put the lead back to 3 at the halfway mark of the first half.
The Bobcats tied the game at 19 with exactly nine minutes left when the Jackets went on a 7-0 run on the back of Ernest Jenkins and Jordan layups and a bomb from Glen Abram to go up 26-19. A quick layup by the Bobcats cut it to five points, but Abram launched another one from the left side to put the Jackets up eight. Wesleyan nailed one of their own from distance and Abram answered right back from around the same spot on the floor to go up 32-24. The Bobcats hit three straight jumpers to shrink the lead back to two at the 3:40 mark. A layup from Moore, another jack from outside from Abram, two free throws and a layup by Pittman gave the Jackets a 41-34 lead going into the break.
Pittman hit a layup on WVSU's opening possession of the first half to bump the Yellow Jacket lead to nine. For the next four minutes, the two teams traded buckets. The Jackets maintained a nine point lead going in to the under-15 timeout. Moore showcased his prowess at the charity stripe going 4 for 4 over the next five minutes and added two more layups to carry his point total on the night to 29 with 10:10 to go. Jones added a layup before the media timeout.
A pull-up from Pittman coming out of the timeout brought the lead back to nine points, but a jumper and a jack from range cut the lead to just four points. Moore pocketed points 30 and 31 at the free throw line to increase the lead back to six. Jones put home a layup and Moore added another and an and capitalized on an and-one opportunity, bumping the lead back up to nine. Wesleyan hit a pull-up jumper just before the final media timeout to cut the lead to seven, 78-71. The final 5 minutes the two teams both scored 15 points, capped off by Jones hitting two free throws.
The Yellow Jackets have a quick turnaround with a 7:30 matchup scheduled against Glenville State at the Walker Convocation Center on Monday, February 14.
