WILKES-BARRE (Pa.) – The Delaware Valley University men's basketball team got 20 points off the bench from senior Dariel Medina and halted a three-game win streak for host Wilkes University with a 77-63 Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) Freedom victory.
The Aggies have won two of their last three games to improve to 2-4 overall and 1-2 in conference play while the Colonels fell to 3-4 and 1-4 in MAC Freedom.
DelVal started the game with back-to-back treys from Matt Paulus and Ryan Black to take an early 6-0 lead that it maintained until the halfway point of the first half when Wilkes used an 8-0 run to take its first lead of the game, 14-12.
The Colonels lead grew to eight, 25-17, before Medina connected from deep and converted a foul shot for a four-point play to spark a 19-4 DelVal run to close the half and propel it to a 36-29 lead at the break. The defense held Wilkes without a bucket over the final 4:36 of the stanza and Medina scored eight of his 12 first half points in the run.
The Aggies were 12-for-29 (41.4%) from the field and 7-for-12 (58.3%) from deep in the first half, but the home team also shot well at nearly 48% (11-of-23) from the field and 50% (4-of-8) from three-point land.
DelVal took continued to control the game in the second half as it outscored the home team, 24-9, over the first 12:16 to take the largest lead of the game, 60-38, with 7:44 left in regulation. Over a stretch of 18 minutes of game time, the Aggies outscored the Colonels 43-18 and cruised to the 14-point road victory.
Medina finished the game 5-for-7 from deep and the same mark from the free throw line while Pernell Ghee scored 15 points with seven rebounds, three steals, and two assists. Paulus finished with 14 points and four assists and Blacked chipped in with 13 points on 4-of-9 shooting from the field.
As a team, DelVal forced 21 turnovers while only committing 12 and it picked up 15 assists. The squad finished the game shooting 24-for-55 (43.6%) from the field and 11-of-22 (50%) from deep, and nearly 82% (18-of-22) from the charity stripe.
Wilkes was led by Trent Fisher's 15 points and seven rebounds and shot over 46-percent from the field but was 7-for-20 (35%) from deep and went 8-for-11 from the line.
