Grand Canyon University (11-8, 2-0 WAC) held off defending regular season Western Athletic Conference champ Utah Valley University (6-10, 0-2 WAC) Thursday night at the UCCU center in Orem, Utah. A close game all the way through, there were 10 tied scores and 8 lead changes.
Again the Lopes were lead by DeWayne Russell who scored a game high 24 points. Jerome Garrison had his best game of the year scoring 20 points. Daniel Alexander had a double-double with 15 points and 11 boards. Joshua Braun added 11 points.
The Wolverines were led by Marcel Davis and Zach Nelson. They both finished with 20 points each. Mitch Bruneel also scored 11 points.
GCU and UVU kept the game close the entire first half as both teams went into halftime tied at 35. The second half saw much of the same as GCU jumped out to a 50-45 lead with 12:09 left. UVU was keeping close as they only trailed 70-69 with 2:42 in the second half. Daniel Alexander then hit a 3 pointer to give the Lopes some breathing room. Dewayne Russell then made 5 costless throws over the final 1:18 to ice it for the Lopes. Russell was 11-12 for the game shooting costless throws. GCU out rebounded the Wolverines 38-33. The Lopes ended up shooting 47.5 percent (29-61) while UVU shot 42.1 percent (24-57) for the game.
Grand Canyon will now travel to the defending WAC tournament champs New Mexico State on January 22nd at 7 p.m. in Las Cruses, N.M. Utah Valley will head to Edinburg Texas and the University of Texas-Pan American to take on the Broncos on January 22nd at 6:00 p.m.
NOTES:
This was the first win for the Lopes versus Utah Valley in the WAC. The Wolverines had won the previous two matches.
DeWayne Russell matched his GCU career high in points with 24. Daniel Alexander also had his season high in rebounds with 11.
Utah Valley senior Mitch Bruneel was named the WAC Player of the Week on Monday. He was coming off a 27 point, 11 rebound game against Seattle University.