MEN'S BASKETBALL Westminster's wide-open offense works

Key statistics favored Grove City, but the scoreboard favored Westminster, 91-86.
By BILL ALBRIGHT
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
NEW WILMINGTON, Pa. -- There was good and bad news for the Westminster College men's basketball team in its game against rival Grove City Wednesday night.
The bad news was, that for the first time in four games, the Titans (7-9, 2-0 President's Athletic Conference) failed to reach 100 points. The good news was that they didn't need to, defeating the Wolverines, 91-86.
"I told the guys at halftime that I didn't really care about the point total," said Titans coach Larry Ondako. "We are just doing this [running a wide open offense] to give us a chance to win ball games. I didn't know where it would take us, but all three times we scored in the 90s, we are 3-0."
Lead for good
The Titans trailed for all but the final seconds of the first half, and, after a tie at 60-all, Westminster went on an 11-0 run to take the lead for good.
"We didn't have a great first half, but I told them that if we were feeling bad after the half we played, we are winning," said Ondako. "How do you think they [Grove City] felt, because they shot 67 percent and were losing by two at halftime."
Mark DeMonaco and Ed Pagley led the Titans with 21 and 20 points, respectively. Pagley also had six steals.
"We came out real sluggish in the first half," said Pagley. "That is just not us because that is not how our system is set up right now. We got together at halftime and decided that we need to come out with a lot more enthusiasm. We just weren't into the flow of the game, but in the second half we picked it up."
Grove City's Tanner Prosser turned in an outstanding effort. The senior finished with a triple-double of 13 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists.
"I would definitely trade my effort for a win," said Prosser. "They [Westminster] play a different style of basketball that we haven't seen this year. We thought we were prepared for them, but as it turned out, we just didn't make the plays we needed to make. It just came down to a few shots they hit that we didn't."
Ryan Eller led all scorers with a career-high 32 points for Grove City.
Puzzled
Grove City coach Steve Lamie had a difficult time figuring out how his team lost. The Wolverines (6-10, 0-2) shot 63 percent from the field and outrebounded the Titans, 41-31.
"With those two numbers, you would like to think that you are going to win the game," said Lamie. "They made more 3s then we did [16-8], but what also killed us is that we only shot 50 percent from the free throw line.
"If you look at those numbers -- plus we had 24 turnovers to 11 for them -- that is where we lost the game.
"We wanted a slower tempo and then just make sure that we handled the ball," Lamie said. "We wanted to make them drive a little more rather than shoot so many 3s. I thought we had a good game plan coming in, but we just didn't execute it."
Grove City's Ryan Eller led all scorers with 32 points.