Recap
Junior DeAnte Bruton scored 13 of his game-high 20 points in the second half to lift the No. 24 Nichols College men's basketball team to an 82-63 win over Western New England University Wednesday night in Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) action at the Nichols Athletic Center.
 
Freshman Jaekwon Spencer came off the bench and poured in a career-high 14 points for the Bison (19-2, 11-1 CCC), who ran their win streak to eight games and remained atop the CCC standings. Sophomore Matt Morrow filled the stat sheet with 14 points and 15 rebounds while junior Jerome Cunningham notched 12 points, seven rebounds, three assists, and three steals.
 
Senior guard Mikey Pettway paced the Golden Bears (8-13, 5-7 CCC) with 13 points. Sophomore Zachary Tavitian posted a double-double with 11 points and 10 boards as WNE shot 40 percent from the field and knocked down 13 of its 15 attempts from the charity stripe.
 
The Bison scored the first 11 points of the contest and held a four-point halftime lead behind 10 points from Spencer. Tavitian paced the visitors with nine points in the first half. A layup by Pettway early in the second half gave the Golden Bears a three-point lead (41-38) before a 27-12 run over the next seven-and-a-half minutes by the Bison allowed them to open up a 12-point lead following a triple from Bruton. Later, a pair of layups from Spencer gave NC a 17-point advantage with 3:47 left in the stanza.
 
Three things you need to know…

-Tonight's contest marked the 41st all-time meeting between Nichols College and Western New England University. The Bison have now won three-straight and seven of the last eight meetings, and lead the series 27-14.

-Morrow 's double-double was his 12th of the season. Over his last three games, the Leicester, Mass. native is averaging 17.3 ppg and 14.0 rebounds.

-The Bison scored 22 points in transition and turned 22 WNE turnovers into 15 points.
 
Quote
"Western New England is a tough, talented team. They played us as well as anyone has all season in the first half. DeAnte did what DeAnte does in the second half and really took control of the game for us. Our big's played well and we got a nice spark off the bench from Jaekwon." –Nichols head coach Scott Faucher
 
Next game
Tuesday, February 5 vs Roger Williams, 7:30 p.m.