FULTON, Mo. - No. 9/No. 1 seed William Woods University (27-2) continued its consistent domination, routing rival No. 5 seed Missouri Baptist University (13-17) 78-55 Saturday at Anderson Arena to advance to its third American Midwest Conference tournament championship.
"I thought we did a solid job of building off last game," William Woods men's basketball coach
Jordan Ashton said. "We need to keep going with it and focus on the same things."
Three Owls scored in double figures:
Tre Titus recorded 15 points (3-6 3-pointers), two rebounds, two assists and one steal;
Francis Okwuosah 15 points (7-12 field goals), six boards, a game-high four steals and one block and
D'Mari Wiltz 14 points (4-4 free throws), a game-high nine assists, two rebounds and one steal.
On the defensive end, William Woods'
Kevin Taylor collected a game-high nine boards,
Henry Shannon III posted four rebounds, three steals and a co-game-high two blocks and
Aaiden Ashton had seven rebounds and a co-game-high two blocks.
It didn't take long for the Owls to go in front by double digits, 4:16 to be exact, as Titus knocked down a 3-pointer assisted by Wiltz. That was toward the tail end of WWU's game-opening 20-4 run. During the Owls' great start, Shannon stole the ball and gave them the lead for good at 4-2 with an explosive fastbreak slam from a Titus helper just 1:13 into the contest; Taylor and Titus each had a 3-pointer, and Okwuosah had four points, three rebounds and two steals - Okwuosah's end-to-end layup off his steal capped the run.
Although William Woods remained comfortably in front, Missouri Baptist didn't let the Owls make their lead too insurmountable in the first half. The Woods' most significant advantage of the first half was 17 points (27-10) on
Nate Schwartze's 3-pointer provided by Wiltz. Schwartze's triple occurred with 10:33 left before halftime. Following that basket, the Spartans and Owls scored 19 points apiece to end the first half as WWU held a 46-29 advantage.
William Woods came out firing to begin the second half, increasing its lead to 20 (52-32) on Okwuosah's coast-to-coast bucket, which concluded a half-opening 6-2 Owls run - Okwuosah had four of those points. Missouri Baptist used its defense to stay in the game, cutting its deficit to 17 points before WWU put up six unanswered points on
Aaiden Ashton, Shannon and Wiltz layups to increase the Owls' cushion to 66-43.
While the Spartans' defense ensured William Woods didn't pile onto its lead, the Owls' defense, in turn, made certain MBU wouldn't take the lead, let alone reduce WWU's advantage to single digits.
Jordan Ashton's younger brother,
Aaiden Ashton, elevated the Owls' lead to a game-high 27 points (78-51) on his triple from an
Adam Barbieri offensive board with 57 seconds remaining. Coincidentally, MBU's 4-0 run to end the game meant Woods won by 23 points -
Aaiden Ashton's number.
The Owls brought down 35 boards (11 offensive) with 15 second-chance points, scored 14 points off 15 forced turnovers and shot 47.6% (30-63) from the field, 36.4% (8-22) from 3-point range and 100% (10-10) at the free-throw line. The Spartans had 28 rebounds (six offensive) with three second-chance points, tallied seven points off six forced turnovers and converted 40% (18-45) from the field, 30.8% (4-13) from deep and 78.9% (15-19) from the stripe.
In a matchup of the top two teams in the AMC, William Woods hosts No. 15/No. 2 seed Central Baptist College (26-4, 17-1 AMC) in the championship of the AMC Men's Basketball Tournament Presented by Tandem HR at 7 p.m. Tuesday. The Owls and Mustangs split the regular season series, though WWU took the most recent matchup by a wider margin on Jan. 23 in Fulton, 79-74.
"This is what it's about,"
Jordan Ashton said. "Top 15 matchup, top two teams in the conference competing for a conference title. It's going to be a war for 40 minutes; we need to be ready to go."
