WALLA WALLA, Wash. - Darne Duckett led all scorers with 20 points on 5-7 shooting in three pointers, Weston Crump put up a career-high 11 points and the Whitman College men's basketball team topped Pacific Lutheran 88-64 in Northwest Conference action on Saturday night at the Sherwood Center.

A trio of other Whitman starters put up double figures as well. Jaron Kirkley scored 16 and grabbed four rebounds, Nikola Trifunovic put up 15 points on 3-4 shooting in three pointers and Robert Colton added 13 points and a game-high six rebounds.

Leighton Kingma posted a double double with 10 points and 10 rebounds for the Lutes, and Seth Hall added a team-high 18 points.

It took a while to get going, but Blues basketball was on full display for much of the game. Whitman scored 27 points off 26 PLU turnovers as the Lutes found difficulty dealing with Whitman's press in the first half and leading into the second. Colton added three steals to his stat line with Kirkley posting two more.

Both teams struggled in the early going but it were the Lutes who held the early lead. Hall's three pointer sparked an early run to put his team up 8-2 with 15:27 to play. Crump came off the bench and got the Blues going, nailing back-to-back triples to give Whitman its first lead at 12-10. The run continued but this time it was Nikola Trifunovic's turn. He drilled a pair of three pointers of his own as the lead swelled to 22-12 with 8:41 to play until halftime.

Connor Gregor connected on a pair of layups to stem the tide as the Lutes were intent on not letting the game get away from them. PLU kept the deficit in and around 10 points until Trifunovic heated up from the floor again. He hit on a jumper to force a Lute timeout, then later dialed long distance to put the Blues up 38-25 with 4:08 to play.  Duckett's layup inside of a minute helped Whitman to a 17-point halftime lead.

The Blues fired on cylinders to start the second half. Colton completed an and-one three point play to cap an early run and put his team up 18. Duckett's three pointer later extended the lead to 19 points but a mini rally made up of buckets from Hall and Jordan Thomas made it a 58-44 ball game.

Inside of 10 minutes however, the Blues went on a 13-3 run to all but seal the win.

The Blues continue their Northwest Conference homestand next week with games against Lewis & Clark (Jan. 10) and Willamette (Jan. 11).