Winthrop, South Carolina St. Win Tournament Openers
ROCK HILL, SC--Winthrop and South Carolina State earned the right to face each other in Saturday night’s championship game of the 2001 Costner Brothers Winthrop Shoot-Out with first-round victories Friday night. Winthrop defeated Tennessee-Martin, 86-60, in the nightcap while South Carolina State routed West Virginia State, 91-62 in the opener.
Winthrop (4-5) will face SC State (3-8) at 7:00 p.m. following the consolation game which begins at five o’clock.
Greg Lewis led the Eagles with his third consecutive double-double as he scored 15 points and pulled down 10 rebounds. Freshmen Ivan Jenkins and Sheldon Bailey had collegiate highs in scoring with 11 and 12 points, respectively. Tennessee-Martin was led by Brian Foster with 14 points while Jair Peralta scored 13 and Jeremy Sargent led the Skyhawks in rebounding with eight.
Winthrop had its best shooting performance of the season as the Eagles connected on 54 percent from the floor (35-65). UTM was held to 35 percent shooting on 18 of 52. The Eagles also won the rebound battle handily, 43-30.
After leading by only five at halftime, 40-35, Winthrop still led by seven at 51-44 with 14:42 left in the game when they broke the game open by outscoring the visitors 21-9 over the next eight minutes to take a 72-50 lead.
In the first game, the South Carolina State Bulldogs jumped on their Division II foe early as they took a 20-7 lead in the opening 6:47. West Virginia State made a run near the end of the first half to close to within 41-30 at intermission , but the Bulldogs were too much in the second half as they outscored the Yellow Jackets 22-6 in the first seven minutes of the second half to take a commanding 63-36 lead.
The Bulldogs had a three-prong offensive attack led by Andre Riviera with a game-high 23 points. Greg Grey added 22 while Dexter Hall had a double-double with 18 points and 15 rebounds. West Virginia State was led by Ronald Donaldson with 20 while Mike Taylor chipped in with 16.
SC State shot 49 percent for the game (40-81) compared to WV State’s 34 percent (20-59). The bigger Bulldogs also dominated the glass 53-37 with Hall leading the way.
