Pilots Light Up Lancers
WINONA LAKE – The Bethel College men’s basketball team put on some kind of shooting display Saturday.
The No. 5 Pilots were dialed in from distance in running past Grace College 110-69 in Crossroads League action.
Bethel outscored the Lancers 60-24 in a dominating second-half performance in play at the Manahan Orthopaedic Capital Center on the Grace College campus.
The Pilots, who entered the game shooting 43 percent from deep, improved on that Saturday. Bethel hit 14-22 from 3-point range, including tickling the twine with an astounding 10-15 from beyond the arc in the final half.
Bethel led just 50-45 at intermission. It was an avalanche of points in the final 20 minutes that the Pilots produced to turn the game into a rout. Bethel opened the final half with a quick 15-3 run that quickly turned into a 37-5 onslaught.
Senior Ryan Benner, a silky-smooth 6-4 guard, poured in 37 points for the Pilots. Benner, a former star at Mishawaka High School, hit 11-12 from the field, including 4-4 from deep.
The Pilots, who improve to 14-2 overall and 3-1 in league play, finished 35-54 overall from the field. Bethel entered play Saturday averaging 91.5 points-per-game.
Junior guard Zach Miller, Bethel’s top scorer and ranked No. 1 in the nation with over four 3-pointers per game, had 19 points. Freshman Caleb Oetjen 13 and senior Landon Booker 11 for the Pilots, who now lead the all-time series with Grace 61-60. Benner, Miller and Oetjen each hit four triples for the winners.
Sophomore Logan Irwin, a former standout at Whitko High School who played last year at Stetson University, led the Lancers with 14 points. Sophomore Caleb Featherston, who hails from Huntington, had 11 points and senior Greg Miller and junior Niko Read each had nine for Grace, which beat Bethel 96-83 in their last meeting last season.
The Lancers, who drop to 8-7 overall and 0-4 in league play, shot just 8-29 from 3-point range in the loss.
“Wow,” said Grace College coach Jim Kessler as he scanned the final stat sheet and perused the Bethel shooting numbers. “Hat’s off to them for shooting that way. That’s fantastic shooting. No one can beat them if you get into a shooting contest.
“You have to play ugly and grind it against Bethel. You have to play a certain way to beat them and we didn’t do that. They played very well and we didn’t today. There’s no excuses. They rocked it today.
“The tempo was huge and it was totally how Bethel wanted it. But, we can’t hang our heads. We have to get back at it on Monday.”
Both Grace and Bethel were coming off big wins Tuesday. The Lancers topped No. 23 Ashford 67-59 at home, while the Pilots stopped No. 12 NorthWood 77-74 in a tourney in Florida.
The game also saw two of the winningest coaches in the country square off. Kessler has 689 of the 996 wins in Grace College men’s basketball history. Bethel coach Mike Lightfoot now has 698 career wins.
Benner scored 21 points in the opening half Saturday to pace the Pilots to their lead. The Pilots were 18-30 from the field. Featherston netted 11 points as the Lancers hit 7-14 from deep in the opening half to stay close.
Grace hosts Spring Arbor Tuesday night at 7 p.m. in Crossroads League play. Bethel is scheduled to host league foe and No. 16 St. Francis Tuesday in Mishawaka.