FORT MYERS, FLA. - Lorne Merthie led four double-figure scorers
with 16 points and Campbell defeated Florida Gulf Coast 64-52
Saturday evening at Alico Arena to move into second place in the
Atlantic Sun Conference standings.
Merthie hit a career-high 5-of-9 threes and matched his season-best
with 5 assists and just one turnover in 38 minutes. Miles Taylor
added 13 points for his 8th double-figure outing on the road this
year. Jonathan Rodriguez scored 11 points, all in the second half,
and grabbed 7 rebounds, while Kyle Vejraska came off the bench to
add 11 on 4-6 shooting, plus 3-3 from the line.
Rodriguez moved past Willie Jackson of Centenary into second place
on the A-Sun career rebounding list. The Bayamon, P.R., native now
has 1017 boards in 114 games.
William Kossangue grabbed a career-high 8 rebounds and the Camels
won the battle on the glass 33-25. Junard Hartley dealt 8 assists
for Campbell (14-9, 9-5), which won its second-straight game and
improved to 5-3 on the road in A-Sun play.
Brett Williams scored a career-high 19 points to lead the Eagles
(7-17, 4-11), who lost their fourth-straight game. Anthony Banks
scored 15 on 7-9 shooting and pulled down 6 boards.
"I thought the fact that Lorne stayed mentally tough and kept
taking shots, even though he missed a few, and Jonathan hit a
couple of threes, that really opened up the middle of their zone,"
said Campbell head coach Robbie Laing. "We finally turned them
over in the second half, got some offense that way, and some
rebound put backs as well -- all those things combined gave us a
chance to stretch it out."
Trailing by one at the break (25-24), Campbell shot 56 percent
(14-25) from the floor in the second half and pulled away with an
18-5 run midway through the final period.
After Banks made the second of two foul shots to pull FGCU within
44-42 with 10:44 left, Taylor fueled a decisive 11-0 burst with 6
points and the Camels stretched the gap to 62-47 on Kossangue's
short bank with 2:30 remaining.
FGCU went 5:56 without a field goal from the 11:09 mark until 5:13
was left in the contest. The Camels scored 15 second-chance points
in the final stanza off 9 offensive boards. CU finished with 21
points off 15 Eagle turnovers.
Including Thursday's 65-47 victory at Stetson, Campbell swept an
A-Sun road series for the first time since winning at Kennesaw
State and Mercer, Jan. 31-Feb. 2, 2009.
"A lot of guys had better numbers on the team, but I'd give Hartley
the MVP," said Coach Laing. "Even though he had three fouls, he
had kept us together in the second half."
Campbell committed 8 first-half turnovers and hit only 5-of-10 from
the line while shooting 40 percent from the floor. Hartley picked
up 3 fouls and played only 10 minutes prior to the break.
Rodriguez, who entered the game averaging 17.9 points (4th in the
A-Sun) was scoreless on 0-of-2 shooting from the field and played
only 12 minutes in the opening half after collecting a pair of
fouls.
Campbell used an early 10-0 run to take a 12-4 lead with 12:34
remaining in the half. Kyle Vejraska came off the bench to score 5
points in the flurry. FGCU responded with a 10-1 burst and led
14-13 when Reggie Chambers hit a pair of foul shots with 7:48 to
play.
Campbell moved to just one-half game behind A-Sun leader
Jacksonville (9-4) in the conference standings. FGCU has dropped
10 of its last 12 games overall.
Campbell matched the 14 victories posted by last year's club (and
in 2006-07) for the program's most wins in a year since the 1996
team finished 17-11.
Coupled with last month's 61-45 win over the Eagles, the Camels
swept the season series from FGCU and stretched their win streak to
three over the southernmost A-Sun member. Campbell improved to
12-3 this year when holding foes to less than 70 points in a
game.
The Camels begin a 4-game home stand Friday against Mercer.
