Cedarville Wins 5th Straight

The Jackets matched their season-high with a five-game winning streak, defeating the Wilberforce Bulldogs 94-73 on Saturday night. Junior J.C. Faubion led the way, tying a career-high with 35 points on 75 percent shooting and five assists. Cedarville head coach Pat Estepp said Faubion matched his career high in points because of his off-ball movement.

“He didn’t stop moving,” Estepp said. “He came off screens and was cutting really well. That is a big reason he got those 35.”

Sophomore Patrick Bain scored 12 points and dished out nine assists, freshman Robert Okoro had eight points and 10 rebounds, and freshman Kwenton Scott scored 12 points off the bench. Jason Reep got to start on senior night in his last regular-season game in front of the home crowd. He scored the Jackets’ second basket of the game.

The Jackets shot 60 percent from the field, and the defense held the Bulldogs to 41 percent shooting. Cedarville also had 27 assists on 35 field goals and has won its past five games.

“Really proud of how we moved the ball,” Estepp said. “I thought we did a great job making the extra pass. We have started doing that in the last two weeks and we are scoring a lot more and shooting a lot higher because of it.”

The Jackets started off hot with a 12-2 lead, then Wilberforce crawled back to make the score 19-16. Cedarville got it together after that and went into the half up 46-29.

Faubion scored 12 first-half points and Scott provided a nice spark off the bench with 10 points. Cedarville shot 59 percent in the first half and held the Bulldogs to 37 percent.

The Jackets kept their large lead for most of the second half. About halfway throughm the Bulldogs began to cut at the lead and were down 72-60 at one point. The Jackets began to pick it up again and an alley-oop from Faubion to Okoro got the team on a roll.

The Jackets (13-13) will look to push their winning streak to six games when they visit conference opponent Alderson Broaddus on Thursday. Estepp also said he is hopeful that starting point guard Justice Montgomery can return to the court sometime next week. Montgomery suffered high ankle sprain during the team’s two-game road trip last week.

Josh Burris is a junior journalism major and multimedia person for Cedars. He is interested in sports broadcasting and reporting. He enjoys watching sports, lifting, and listening to rock and rap music.