BUIES
CREEK,
N.C. Reggie Bishop scored a season-high 23 points and
Jonathan Rodriguez added his fourth-straight double-double to lift
Campbell to an 87-70 men's basketball win over visiting Radford
Saturday at Carter Gym.
Rodriguez scored 22 points,
grabbed 10 rebounds and had six assists plus three steals for the
Camels (2-3), who ended a three-game losing streak. Bishop made 7-of-14 from the field,
including 3-of-8 three-point shots and hit all six of his free
throw attempts as the senior guard from Gadsden, Ala., finished
just one point shy of his career high.
Freshman Jose Cami added a
season-best 12 points on 4-of-7 three-point shooting for the Camels
who scored a season-high 87 points while making more free throws
(24-of-33) than the Highlanders attempted (12-of-21).
Martell McDuffy led Radford
with 20 points on 6-of-14 shooting. Joey Lynch-Flohr chipped in 13 on
6-of-8 shooting before fouling out with 4:46 left in the game. The Highlanders (1-5) dropped
their third-straight contest.
Campbell committed a season-worst 27
turnovers, but forced 26 Radford miscues and converted those into a
34-23 edge in points off turnovers. The Camels also held a 39-25 advantage
on the boards and limited Radford to just six second-chance
points.
Radford led by as many as
nine in the first half and held a 26-18 edge with 5:30 left in the
period when Phillip Martin hit a jump shot. The Camels, however, reeled off 16-5
flurry as Cami hit two threes in the stretch to take a 34-31 lead
with 1:29 to go. Cami's
triple in the left corner at the buzzer gave Campbell a 37-36
advantage at the break, a lead the Camels never
relinquished.
After McDuffy's free throws
brought Radford within 43-41 with 18:33 remaining, the Camels
scored eight unanswered points to build a 51-41 cushion with 14:45
to go. Radford cut the
margin to as few as five points on four occasions, the last on Alex
Gynes' bucket down low with 6:53 to play that cut the gap to
65-60.
The Camels, however,
responded with a 12-2 burst and led 77-62 with 2:42 left as
Rodriguez had five points and an assist in the flurry.
Campbell entered the game shooting
just 58.3 percent from the line as a team, but made 22-of-28 (.786)
in the final period from the stripe, including 10-of-12 in the last
2:42.
"Free throws make all the
difference in the world; they limit your dry spells. A couple of times in the second half
when we were going through a dry spell, we were able to get to the
line and ended up hitting 79 percent of our attempts," said
Campbell head coach Robbie Laing.
Not only did the Camels hit a
season-high point total, but CU's 52.9 percent shooting from the
field (27-51) was the team's best through five games. Campbell also knocked down 9-of-21
threes (.429).
Campbell improved to 4-0 all-time at
Carter Gym against Radford, its former rival in the Big South
Conference. The Camels
return to action Wednesday in a 7:30 p.m. start at South
Carolina.