Bloomington, Ill. - The Thunder men's basketball team avenged an earlier loss at the buzzer on Wednesday night with a 107-95 victory at Illinois Wesleyan. The Titans, ranked 17th in the latest D3hoops.com Top 25 poll, had knocked off Wheaton with a buzzer-beating three-pointer at King Arena in December. With the victory, Wheaton pulls within a game of the CCIW-leading Titans at 8-4 in the CCIW and 15-6 overall. The Titans fall to 16-5 overall and 9-3 in the conference, one game ahead of Wheaton, Augustana, and North Central. Wheaton will be back in action on Saturday when the Thunder travel to North Park for a 7 pm tip-off against the Vikings in Chicago.

"Obviously it's a big win for us." noted head coach Mike Schauer after the victory. "At our best we are an extremely difficult team to guard. We had five guys in double figures again tonight." With an opportunity for a conference title still alive, the Thunder mentor said, "This should be a fun couple of weeks for our league."

Wheaton's 107 points scored are the most for the Thunder in a regulation game since Wheaton scored 127 against Grinnell in 2009, and the most against a "non-system" team since Wheaton posted 112 points against Principia in 2006. The 107 points allowed by the Titans are the most by a "non-system" team since the Shirk Center opened in 1994 and the most allowed in a regulation by a "non-system" team since Tampa scored 112 against the Titans in 1988.

Both teams posted impressive offensive numbers by shooting above 50% from the field on 66 shot attempts. Wheaton shot 54.5%, making 36 of its 66 shot attempts. Wheaton made 12-of-26 attempts from the three-point line (46.2%) and shot 23-of-33 (69.7%) on free throw attempts. The Titans shot 50% on 33-of-66 shooting, but struggled from the three-point line, shooting just 23.8% (5-21). The hosts were 77.4% (24-31) at the charity stripe. Wheaton won the rebounding battle 40-35 including an 11-9 edge in offensive rebounds.

In a matchup of the top two scorers in the conference, Illinois Wesleyan took the game's first lead on a Brady Rose jumper just over 100 seconds into the game only to have Wheaton take the lead for good on a deep three-pointer by Aston Francis on the ensuing possession. Luke Peters pushed Wheaton's lead as high as seven points on a pair of occasions as Peters scored eight of his 17 points in the first half. Kobe Eichelberger's jumper at the 7:52 mark pushed Wheaton's lead up to 32-22, before the Titans started to chip away.

Taking advantage of early Thunder foul trouble, The Titans pulled within a point at 36-35 with 4:17 to play following six straight made free throws. Francis answered with a three-pointer and after an Alex O'Neill lay-up, started a five-point spurt with a steal and breakaway lay-up. Grant Wolfe brought the Titans back to within four with a minute to play in the half, but Francis closed the half with five-straight points including an emphatic fadeaway three-pointer at the buzzer in front of the Titan bench to put Wheaton ahead 52-43.

Wheaton continued its run to start the second half, running off 10 unanswered points over the first 2:21 of the second half to lead 62-43. Illinois Wesleyan again worked their way back and brought the crowd back into it with a Miles Curry dunk that cut the Wheaton lead to 66-53 with 14:58 to play in the game. As he did in the first half, Francis answered with a three-pointer that started a 15-0 run over a two-minute span that included eight points by Jay Spencer, giving the Thunder a game-high 81-53 lead with 11:58 remaining.

Illinois Wesleyan started its run with eight unanswered points before Luke Peters scored the first of his eight-straight Wheaton points. Peters' run ended with a lay-up with 5:42 to play, putting Wheaton ahead 91-74. After a Jay Spencer free throw, the Titans scored another six straight points to cut Wheaton's lead to 92-80 at the 4:10 mark. Illinois Wesleyan's ball pressure continued to give the Titans chances to close the gap but they would get no closer than nine points as late as 102-93 with 1:13 to play, but a three-point play by Eichelberger finally put the game away and Francis added a late lay-up to push his scoring total to a game-high 36 points and provide the 107-95 cushion.

Also joining Francis in double figures for Wheaton was Ricky Samuelson and Luke Peters who each scored 17 points. Kobe Eichelberger finished with 16 points and Jay Spencer added 13 points. Brady Rose led five Titans in double figures with 27 points.

Note Worthy: With his fifth three-pointer of the night, Aston Francis broke his own school record for made three-pointers in a single season with his 95th made three-pointer this season...With six three-pointers tonight, Francis moved past Charles Ridley and Wesley Pitts into fourth place on the career three-pointer list with 190...with 36 points, Francis moved past Jerry Truax, Dan Fiddler, and Kerry Pfund into 34th on the career scoring list with 1,167 points...with his 17 points, Ricky Samuelson moves past Jon Nielson, Mike Schauer, and Andrew Jahns into 31st on the career scoring list with 1,025 career points.