GREENSBURG, PA- The University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg men's basketball team never trailed in their senior day contest against Alfred State College, as they rolled to a 79-62 victory. The Bobcats have won their fifth straight to improve 20-4 on the season and 16-3 in the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference. The Pioneers drop to 6-16 and 4-13 in the AMCC.
Pitt-Greensburg has reached 20 wins for the first time since 1999-00, and has boosted their home record to 12-0 this season.
JoJo France scored a game-high 15 points to lead four Bobcats in double figures. Cody Spaid went 6-for-9 from the field to net 12 points and added 8 rebounds, to lead all players. Torian Jenkins added 11 on 5-of-7 shooting and Cam Seigfreid pitched in 10.
Pitt-Greensburg began by scoring 21 of the first 25 points of the game to get out to an early lead (21-4) eight and a half minutes into the contest. The UPG defense held the Pioneers to 1-of-10 shooting (0-4 from three) to begin the game. Six Bobcats scored during the span and were paced by Seigfreid, who tallied six points during the run.
France drained a three pointer with 5:55 left in the first half to push the Bobcat lead to 22, their largest of the half (34-12). Alfred State closed out the half with a 12-4 scoring advantage to trim the Pitt-Greensburg lead to 38-24 at the half.
Brady Kingston made a backdoor cut and took a bounce pass from Spaid to lay in the first basket of the second half. The Pioneers followed that with a 7-0 run to get within single digits for the first time since 16:22 in the first half, and force a Bobcats time out at the 17:23 mark.
UPG came out of the timeout and scored the next six points, which featured a Jenkins steal and slam dunk, to put their lead back above double figures, where it stayed for the rest of the game.
A 10-0 run by Pitt-Greensburg that began with an Isaiah Ziese three at 10:52 and finished with a Spaid layup at 7:59, got the lead up to 23 (61-38). During the run, the Bobcats went 4-for-4 from the field and 2-for-2 from three. France extended the lead to a game high 26 points (68-42) on his third deep ball of the game with 5:23 remaining.
Eleven Bobcats found the scoring column, David Knox and Jake Kitner each scored their first basket of the season in the closing minute of the game.
UPG outshot the opponent 49.2% to 34.4% from the field and 28% to 13.6% from beyond the arc.
The Bobcats assisted on 22 of their 32 made buckets, Spaid and Jenkins each dished out five. Spaid added a season best three blocks to lead the team, while Jenkins swiped three steals to lead the team, who had eight.
The Bobcats final game of the regular season is this Wednesday (Feb. 19) inside Chambers Hall against La Roche College, who currently sits atop the AMCC standings. The Redhawks downed the Bobcats 89-73 in their first matchup.
