Box score
NEWARK, NJ—Senior guard Michael Ojo's career-high 33 points led four double-figure scorers for visiting Lehigh, as the Mountain Hawks defeated NJIT, 92-83, in non-conference men's college basketball Tuesday night in the Estelle and Zoom Fleisher Athletic Center.
Lehigh (9-6) has won five of its last six and the win against NJIT gives the Mountain Hawks, a 2010 NCAA Tournament participant, their first three-game winning streak this season.
Ojo, who came in averaging 12 points per game and whose previous career high was 23 points against Monmouth earlier this season, made eight field goals, including four three-pointers, while shooting 13-for-16 from the foul line against the Highlanders.
Three other Lehigh starters reached double-figure scoring. Sophomore Gabe Knutson finished with 16 points; CJ McCollum, who last year was the first player in Patriot League history named Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year in the same season and who came in averaging 21 points per game, scored 14 points against NJUIT, plus a team-leading 7 rebounds; and, point guard Prentice Small added 10 points and a game-best 9 assists for the Mountain Hawks.
NJIT got 22 points from senior Jheryl Wilson, followed by junior Isaiah Wilkerson, with 19 points, and sophomore Chris Flores, with 17. Wilkerson grabbed a game-high 10 rebounds, completing his second double-double of the season.
Tuesday's 83 points were the most for NJIT this season in 10 games against Division I teams and it also marked the first time the Highlanders' three preseason all-Great West Conference players—Wilson, Wilkerson, and Flores—all reached double-figure points totals in the same game.
Lehigh got 37 of its own team season-best 92 points at the foul line, where the Mountain Hawks shot 37-for-46 (80 percent).
The Highlanders, who made 17-of-23 foul shots in the game, outscored Lehigh from the field, 66-55. NJIT now has four losses in which it outscored the opposition by more than 10 points from the field, but lost on free throws.
The Mountain Hawks took an 11-9 lead on Knutson's jump shot with 15:15 left in the first half and never trailed again, but Lehigh was never able to coast, despite holding multiple double-digit advantages.
The visitors led at the half, 43-33, behind 20 first-half points for Ojo, who scored 14 of Lehigh's first 20 points in the game. NJIT stayed as close it did primarily on its three-point shooting, where the Highlanders were 7-for-8 in the opening half, with five different players connecting from long range.
The Mountain Hawks quickly stretched their 10-point halftime advantage to 15 points, opening the second half, 7-2, in the first 2:57 for a game-best 50-35 lead after Holden Greiner's free throw at 17:03.
NJIT answered with a 9-0 run in the next 2:43, trimming the deficit to 50-44 on Wilson's jump shot with 14:20 left. But that was as close as the Highlanders got the rest of the way, as the teams traded a series of runs that saw the margin swing back up to double-figures and then down to single-digits 18 different times, the last when NJIT's Wilson hit two free throws with 12 seconds, cutting Lehigh's lead from 11 points to the final nine.
The Highlanders, who began a four-game homestand by hosting Lehigh, will be back in action on Saturday at 2 pm, when Marywood visits the Fleisher Athletic Center.
