Box Score Box Score
ROCK HILL, SC—Winthrop ran into a red-hot shooting UNC Asheville team on Thursday night and suffered the second worst loss in the series as the Bulldogs connected on 10 of 15 three-point field goals and coasted to a 88-67 Big South Conference win in the Winthrop Coliseum.
The 21-point loss was also the largest at home for the Eagles since UNC Asheville claimed a 75-54 win during the 1997-98 season. The Bulldog win snapped a two-game losing streak and improves them to 7-8 overall and 2-3 in league play while Winthrop falls to 6-8 and 2-2 in the conference.
Asheville's junior guard combo of J.P. Primm and Matt Dickey combined to score 43 points and were 8 of 10 from behind the arc. Primm finished the game with 24 points while Dickey scored 19. As a team, the Bulldogs connected on 52 percent from the floor (29-56) and won the rebound battle as well 45-38.
Winthrop got 19 points from sophomore guard
Robbie Dreher and 16 from
Matt Morgan. Those two players connected on 11 of 25 field goals, half of the team total. Winthrop shot 34.4 percent from the floor (22-64) and was just 2 of 15 from 3-point land.
Asheville jumped out to an early 16-11 lead in less than five minutes, but Winthrop scored seven unanswered points over a three-minute stretch to take its only lead of the game at 18-16 on a 3-pointer by Dreher. That lead lasted just 53 seconds as Primm answered with a trey. Winthrop trailed 34-29 with 2:10 left in the first half, but the Bulldogs went on a 7-0 run to close the period and led 41-29 at intermission.
Winthrop opened the second half by outscoring UNC Asheville 12-5 and cut the Bulldogs' lead to five points at 46-41 with 14:44 left in the game, but Asheville responded again to the challenge and went on a 11-0 run to build an insurmountable lead 57-41 with 11:36 left to play. Asheville led by as many as 27 at 85-58 with 3:45 left in the game.
Winthrop will return to action on Saturday when it hosts Gardner-Webb at 7 p.m. UNC Asheville will travel to Presbyterian for a 7:30 game.
