on the offensive end to earn a 60-43 home win.
Matt Malloy led all scorers with 14 points and also chipped in a game high 10 rebounds for the Eagles.
The game opened with the visiting Cougars opening a quick 7-2 lead on a inside baskets from Ryan Roa and Matt Hornak sandwiched around a Vinny Baumunk three pointer. Eastern responded with a 24-3 run over the next ten minutes to take command of the game.
Lenny DiMaria sparked the run with consecutive three pointers to tie the game at seven and to take the lead at 10-7. The Eagles forced the COugars into thirteen straight misses from behind the arc and just two field goals in the last 16 minutes of the opening half.
The Eagles hit 5/10 from behind the arc in the opening half including a buzzer beater by
Mike Johnson on a well executed kickout from
David Volpe. Eastern's 34-17 halftime was the team's biggest advantage at the break all year.
Malloy and Johnson led the Eagles into the break with eight points and six rebounds a piece. Johnson also added four assists and a pair of blocked shots. Baumunk led the Cougars with five points at the break.
In the second half the game became very slow as the Eagles sought to take each possession down below ten on the shot clock and the Cougars continued to try to find inside baskets against an Eastern defense that was protecting the inside. Malloy and DiMaria opened the Eagle scoring in the second half with back to back three pointers over four minutes into the half to push the Eagle lead to 40-18.
The Cougars never cut the gap to less than 16 points for the remainder of the night, and they were unable to find an offensive rhythm against the Eastern half court defense. Eleven different Eastern players scored as the Eagles shot 56% for the game. Coach Nadelhoffer said of the game, "Our defensive intensity was very good, and when we took care of the ball, we shot very well, but we are going to have to do a better job taking care of the basketball if we are going to win big games coming up. I'm really pleased with the work we did to keep them from getting easy baskets in the first half."
Eastern improves to 10-7 overall and 7-5 in PAC play and will travel to Alvernia on Saturday.
