BUIES CREEK, N.C. – Campbell opened the game on a 27-5 run and never trailed Friday night and defeated Stetson 73-56 Friday night in its A-Sun regular season finale at the John W. Pope Jr. Convocation Center / Gilbert Craig Gore Arena.

Lorne Merthie scored 19 points, while Chris Reynolds added a career-high 13 off the bench and Kyle Vejraska provided 13, plus eight boards and four blocks for the Camels (14-15, 11-9), who won their fourth-straight game and secured at least a number-six seed in next week's A-Sun Championship tournament. Junard Hartley scored eight points, dealt eight assists and grabbed four steals with no turnovers in 29 minutes.

Garfield Blair led Stetson (13-16, 9-11) with 17 points on 6-of-17 shooting. The Hatters dropped their fourth-straight contest and will play Wednesday as the seventh seed at 8:30 p.m. in the A-Sun Championship quarterfinals at Nashville, Tenn.

The start was monumental," said head coach Robbie Laing. "I thought our team showed a lot of maturity when Stetson crawled back into it. You knew they were going to make a run, but our guys showed a lot of poise down the stretch."

Campbell finished with a winning A-Sun regular season record for the first time since the 2000 club went 10-8 and tied a school record for most A-Sun victories (11). The win also secured CU's first 4-game winning streak since January 2000. The Camels also recorded their most regular season overall wins since the 1996 club won 15 games plus one in the league tournament.

On Friday, Campbell capitalized on a 6:30 drought from the field by the Hatters to build a 22-point advantage, then knocked down 17-of-22 (.773) free throws in the final half.

Trailing 35-20 at the half, the Hatters twice clawed to within five, the last time with 4:23 remaining on Tim Lang's baseline jumper. However, Merthie scored; then Hartley canned a 3 from the left wing to push the lead back to double digits (58-48) with 3:11 to go.

After Blair's drive in the paint trimmed the gap to 58-50 with 2:36 remaining, the Camels made 11 of their next 12 free throws to secure the victory.

Campbell held the Hatters to 33 percent shooting for the game, 30 percent for the opening period (7-of-23). Stetson, which entered the game second among A-Sun schools by hitting 8 threes per outing, connected on just 3-of-21 (.143) from long-distance.

The Camels made 22-of-47 shots (.468), hit 8-of-16 threes and 21-of-30 (.700) from the stripe, while holding a 39-38 edge on the glass. Vejraska (3-5) and Merthie (3-4) combined to make 6-of-9 from 3-point range, while Reynolds hit 4-of-5 from the floor.

CU also won despite the fact that its leading scorer, Jonathan Rodriguez, who entered the game sixth in the league with a 16.3 average, was held to a season-low two points.

Vejraska, who tied a school record with seven blocked shots in Monday's 68-62 win over East Tennessee State, now has 14 rejections in the last three games. Merthie entered the game averaging 9.3 points per outing, but is now averaging 17.8 points over the last four contests.

CU finished its first year in Gore Arena with a 10-4 record, 7-3 against A-Sun competition, and set a school record for largest average home attendance (1619).

Under the direction of Laing, the Camels have won more games in the last four seasons (48) than the program has amassed in any 4-year span since 1996-99. In spite of fielding the 10th-least experienced team among all 343 Division I programs, Campbell more than doubled its regular season league wins total from a year ago (5-11).

Campbell will play Thursday in the quarterfinal round of the A-Sun Championship tournament on the campus of Lipscomb University. Final pairings will be announced after the four final regular season games are played Saturday.