The Illinois Wesleyan men’s basketball team moved up to 10-2 in College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin play after games against North Park and Millikin this week. The Titans took on North Park at home on Monday, February 7 and swept the Vikings away at 73-49.
Senior captain Matthew Leritz paced the Titans once again with 19 points, followed closely by sophomore Ryan Sroka with 14, fellow senior Cory Noe with 12, and junior Luke Yoder with eight. Yoder also managed a game-high eight assists.
Also leading the game for the Titans was junior Cody Mitchell with 12 rebounds.
The first four minutes of the first half proved fruitless for both teams offensively, consisting of back-and-forth turnovers between the Titans and the Vikings. At 16 minutes left, Leritz managed to bank a layup and put two on the board.
Cody took the ball to the net next, adding another two for the Titans with a layup before the Vikings stole the ball back on a rebound and scored. Leritz sank two free throws on a Viking foul, bringing the score to 8-2 with just under 14 minutes left.
Lertiz, Noe and Yoder each produced successful three-pointers, in addition to junior Lucas Heflen finding the net on a jump shot, bringing the Titans up to 20-9 with nine minutes to go.
The Titans rolled into halftime at 39-24 with no intentions of letting the lead slip.
North Park came out of halftime hot, adding 15 points and cutting the Titan advantage to only seven points.
Yoder began the Titan’s second-half recovery with two successful free throws off of a Viking foul before Sroka added an additional three-pointer. Leritz managed two more buckets from the charity stripe, bringing the Titans back up to 59-39.
The Titans kept up a 20-point lead for the final five minutes of the game, thanks to Noe’s third three-pointer of the game and successful free throws by Sroka and freshman Harrison Wilmsen.
Freshman Hakim Williams contributed another layup at the two-minute mark, followed by two frees and a layup by sophomore Connor Heaton to close out the game at 73-49.
The Titans returned to the court on Wednesday, February 9 in Decatur, Ill. to duke it out with Millikin University and returned to Bloomington with a nail-biting 51-49 victory over the Big Blue.
The men’s basketball team will next play Wheaton University on Saturday, February 12 at 4:00 P.M. directly following the women’s basketball game in Shirk Center.