Nov. 15, 2010

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BY: Robert Ivory

CLEVELAND, Ohio- Playing their fourth game in four days may have finally caught up with the Vikings in the first half, but found 47 points after the half to beat Urbana 83-49, Monday night at the Wolstein Center.

"This was one of those kind of games that each guy wanted to play without," head coach Gary Waters said. "They wanted to get though this game. They were a little exhausted, not as motivated as I like."

"I can hand my hat on one thing," Waters said. "They played defense. All I asked them to do was play defense; they played defense. I told them they had to hold this team under 50 points; they did. I told them to hold them under 35 percent shooting; they did that."

Norris Cole led the Vikings with 19 points, but four Vikings in total finished with double-digits as CSU shot 43.9% on the night.

Jeremy Montgomery had 18 points as Tremon Harmon and Devon Long contributed with 13 points each.

The win improves CSU to 4-0 on the year and equals the Viking's best start in school history, equaling the 1963-64 and 1985-86 squads.

"It's good that we're showing consistency because the road games are the key."

Montgomery got the Viking offense going as CSU ran out to a 6-1 lead under the first two minutes.

Urbana tied the Vikings at 10-10, but Cole went right down the floor and put a nice layup in. After a timeout, Cole came out and picked Stefan Perry's pocket, leading to two Montgomery free throws and a 14-10 CSU lead.

The Blue Knights would score the next four points to bring them back even at 14-14 with 11:48 to go. The Vikings went on an 8-0 courtesy of two Devon Long layups and a pair of Cole baskets in the paint.

Freshman Long got extended minutes on the floor (19) and rewarded his coach with 13 points and six rebounds, contributing to CSU's 44 points in the paint.

"Devon can do that, he can score on the block, he likes to," Waters said. "The only issue that he needs to understand that there is more to the game than scoring on the block. The more he works on those other things, the better he's going to get."

Waters was then able to get Cole some rest, as the Vikings pushed out to a ten-point lead, for the first time on the night, with 3:57 on the clock. Cole had played 110 of the 120 total minutes in the three previous days, but was only finished with 28.

The Vikings were able to control the game and held no less than an eight point lead going into the half, as Cole and Harmon found their stroke from the line, each hitting a pair from the line (2:06 and 1:15), but a Cole layup with 29 seconds left gave the Vikings a 36-27 lead going into the half.

In the opening minute of the second half, the Vikes seemed to find the wind in their sails as Harmon put Cleveland up by 11, 38-27.

From that point, the Vikings took over and quickly put the game away getting a 14-point lead with a Cole layup (16:16).

After Urbana's Dyrell Dolson hit a layup with 14:57 left in the game to make it 44-32, the Blue Knights never got within 13 the rest of the night.

Strong play from the bench came in the second half as CSU claimed 20 of their 32 points from their bench in the second half.

The Vikes were outrebounded in the first half 23-20, allowing eight offensive boards, but again able to turn it around in the second frame, as they did the night before. They ended with a 51-38 advantage on rebounds.

Notably, both teams took 76 shots from the free throw line as the Vikings hit 30 out of their 44 (68.2%). Long hit a pair of free throws in the closing seconds to give the Vikings an 83-49 win, with their biggest lead of the night.

With their congested four games in four days over, the Vikings get a break from their schedule and will be in action on Friday (Nov. 19) at Louisiana-Lafayette before heading to Akron for a midweek contest on Wednesday (Nov. 24). The Vikes will be looking to go 5-0 for the first time in school history.