Box Score

BETHANY, Okla. — Southern Nazarene is just thankful finals are over and Christmas is around the corner as the Crimson Storm won their third straight and fifth in six games with a 79-62 win over cross town rival Southwestern Christian.

SNU moved to 8-2 on the year and ran away with it in the end, but it wasn't a breeze by any means.

Jon West seem to be the only consistent force for the Storm as he scored a career-high 18 points and grabbed six boards. The junior was 5-for-9 from the field and was a perfect 8-for-8 from the free throw line. Xavier Alexander scored over half his points from the free-throw line, going 7-for-10, with 13 points and seven boards. Horace McGloster added nine points and six rebounds while Jeremy Lightfoot had seven points and 10 rebounds.

All 12 that played scored and 11 of those had at least one point in the first half as the game looked more like an NHL game as far as substitutions went. All but two players played at least 10 minutes.

SNU was slow coming out of the gate in the first half shooting just 11-for-31 (35.5 percent) in the first half, but went back inside and hit 57.7 percent (15-26) in the second to shot 45.6 percent (26-57) for the game. The Crimson Storm outscored Southwestern 40-18 in the paint and nearly doubled the bench points 41-21. SNU also shot a season high 82.8 percent from the charity stripe hitting 24 of its 29 attempts. The Crimson Storm also out rebounded SWCU 50-27.

After SNU scored the first six points of the game, the expected rout looked to be on, but SWCU bounced right back to take their first lead of the game at 12-11 midway through the first half. The Eagles held a 19-17 lead with 7:44 left before consecutive treys by Adrian Hunter and Kyle Boen sparked a half-ending 18-8 run as the Storm took a 35-27 lead into intermission.

Southern Nazarene didn't get much of a chance to breathe in the second half as SWCU opened the final half with a 14-5 run to take a 41-40 lead. A McGloster dunk made it 42-41, but the Eagles answered with another bucket to take a 43-42 lead with 14:47 left.

That was the last time Southwestern Christian was ahead on the scoreboard as West got a layup and sparked an 18-3 run to give SNU a 60-46 lead and it started to pull away. The Eagles looked to have a little fight left when Zach Bryant hit his second straight trey to make it 67-58 with 2:52 left and SNU led 69-60 with just over two minutes left, but the Storm closed the game on a 10-2 run to head into Christmas break.

The Crimson hit the hardwood again, Dec. 30, when the play the second game of a doubleheader with the women's team at 6 p.m. against York (Neb.)