Men's Basketball December 13, 2015 Monmouth Sports Information

MEN'S BASKETBALL BEATS WAGNER IN FRONT OF SELLOUT CROWD, 73-54

WEST LONG BRANCH, NJ – In front of a raucous sellout crowd of 3,911 at The MAC Sunday, the Monmouth men's basketball team defeated Wagner 73-54 and never trailed in the second half. Micah Seaborn (Fort Worth, TX/Prime Prep Academy) led the way with 19 points and Chris Brady (Greenlawn, NY/Harborfields) contributed 15 points, eight rebounds and four blocks. Monmouth improves to 6-3 on the season, while Wagner drops to 5-3.

"We got back to doing what we're supposed to do in the second half," said head coach King Rice. "Our kids are resilient, we're going to keep fighting too and today we came out on top."

Monmouth had its lead trimmed to six in the second half with 6:00 remaining, but Deon Jones (Wilmington, DE/Sanford School [Towson]) worked into the lane for a layup before Justin Robinson (Lake Katrine, NY/Kingston) pulled off an acrobatic reverse plus the foul to extend the lead to 11. Brady went on a run late, pulling up to knock down his first three of the season before capping the win with a dunk with 1:54 to go. Seaborn would score late to extend the margin to 21 before a late Wagner basket made it 73-54, the final.

MU came out of the locker room with a 12-point edge and built on it immediately with a Brady slam in transition. With 18:34 to go and the Hawks up eight, Seaborn buried a trey to extend the lead back into double-figures. Dwaun Anderson then made cross-feed that Robinson intercepted and dunked after finding himself alone in transition. Brady's dunk at 16:25 knocked the MU lead up to 17, 45-28.

On back-to-back possessions, Seaborn and Collin Stewart (Glenville, N.Y./Mekeel Christian Academy) hit from beyond the arc to bump the lead to 18 with 14:10 remaining before Wagner started to cut into the deficit. Romone Saunders hit a three from straight-on plus the foul, converting the four-point play to put Wagner within single digits at eight. Stewart answered on the next trip, draining a three to make it 54-44 Monmouth. The MU lead got trimmed to six three times before the Blue and White pulled away for good.

In the opening stanza, Monmouth took a 6-4 lead on a deep two from Jones and didn't look back, never trailing the rest of the game. MU went on a 9-0 first-half run in a 3:40 span, getting five in a row from Seaborn and a finish from Austin Tilghman (Wilmington, DE/Archbishop Carroll [PA]) after he made a great pass to Jones on the prior trip to make the score 25-15. Robinson banged a long triple with 1:48 left in the half and Je'lon Hornbeak (Arlington, TX/Grace Prep [Oklahoma]) pulled up with a hand in his face and netted a three with 43 seconds to go to push the Monmouth lead to 15. Anderson grabbed an offensive board and hit falling away at the first half buzzer to make the score 32-20 MU at the break.

Monmouth shot 51% from the field, 50% from deep and 83.3% from the line as well as outrunning Wagner on the fast break 14-6. MU held the Seahawks to under 33% from the floor and 25% from the outside in the game. Seaborn added 19 on 6-11 shooting and five threes, a career-best. Brady had 15 on 5-9 FG with eight rips and four blocks, while Jones pitched in 10 points and Robinson had 12 with six boards and three assists. Mike Aaman led Wagner with 12 points and nine rebounds, and Anderson and Saunders put in 11 apiece.

MU is back on the floor Tuesday night at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. for a matchup with Georgetown. Tip is set for 7:30 p.m. on Fox Sports 1.

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