Box score

NEWARK, NJ—Senior center Herb Pope scored 25 points to lead Seton Hall, which stretched a two-point halftime lead into a 78-48 men's basketball win over visiting NJIT Tuesday night in the Prudential Center.
 
Pope was one of four starters to reach double-figure scoring for Seton Hall, which won for seventh time in eight starts this season and posted its third win in its third meeting, all in the last three years, against non-conference foe NJIT, which dropped to 3-5.
 
The Pirates, who were coming off of a 22-point over Auburn in the BIG EAST/SEC Challenge last weekend, led 34-32 at the half against NJIT and actually allowed the Highlanders to tie the score twice in the opening 44 seconds of the second half.
 
But Pope's layup put Seton Hall on top to stay, 38-36, with 18:59 remaining and the Pirates rolled to a 40-12 advantage from that point on.
 
In addition to Pope, who made 10 of 15 shots from the field, three other Seton Hall starters reached double-figure scoring and the fifth starter, sophomore Fuquan Edwin, who came in averaging 14.7 points per game, added nine points against the Highlanders.
 
Freshman guard Aaron Cosby scored 12 points for the Pirates, while sophomore Patrik Auda and senior Jordan Theodore added 11 points apiece.
 
Theodore, the Seton Hall point guard, dished out a career-high 11 assists for his third points-assists double-double of the season. He notched his old high of 10 assists four different times, including each of the preceding two games.
 
NJIT, which lost its previous game at Georgetown (#18 AP/#21 ESPN/USA TODAY), suffered back-to-back setbacks for the first time this season and for the first time since the Highlanders ended a six-game losing streak with a victory last season on January 8. NJIT had gone the last 18 games of 2010-11 and the first seven games this season without consecutive losses.
 
The top scorer for the Highlanders on Tuesday against Seton Hall was senior Isaiah Wilkerson, who finished with 13 points and added five rebounds and a team-leading four assists. Junior Ryan Woods scored 10 points for NJIT.
 
Junior center Sean McCarthy had one of his best career games against the BIG EAST front line of Seton Hall, which includes Pope, who is ranked fifth in the nation in rebounds (11.7 rpg) in the latest NCAA stats. McCarthy, who played 14 minutes, grabbed a game-high eight rebounds and scored six points on 2-for-2 shooting both from the field and at the foul line.
 
In the previous game at Georgetown, the Highlanders managed to overcome a rough start that saw them fall behind, 18-4, to play the powerful Hoyas even (24-24) over the final 11 minutes of the opening half. That solid work went out the window in the second half when Georgetown opened the period an 18-0 run and finished with a 42-16 second-half scoring advantage, turning a 14-point halftime lead into an 84-44 final.
 
Against Seton Hall, the Highlanders fell in an 8-0 hole in the opening two minutes, but they settled in and actually took a 22-19 lead on Wilkerson's 3-pointer with 8:45 left in the half. Seton Hall's Freddie Wilson answered with his only basket of the game, a three on the next possession, and there would be two more ties in the first half before The Hall claimed a 34-32 edgeat the break.
 
Pope had 15 points to lead everyone, while Cosby's six points were next on the Pirate scoring chart. Wilkerson had eight points for NJIT, followed by seven from Chris Flores and six each from Woods and McCarthy.
 
The team rebounding stood at 15 for each team, which was an encouraging development for the Highlanders, who had been overwhelmed on the boards, 47-22, at Georgetown.
 
Facing Seton Hall's pressure defense, NJIT committed just four opening-half turnovers to six for the Pirates. Even with that, the Pirates had a slim 5-2 lead on points-off-of-turnovers in the opening 20.
 
As encouraging as the first half was for the Highlanders against Seton Hall, the second half actually wound end up slightly worse for NJIT on the scoreboard than the second half against Georgetown three days earlier.
 
The Pirates did the Hoyas two points better in their second halves against NJIT, outscoring the Highlanders 44-16 after the break, compared to Georgetown's 42-16.
 
But it didn't start that way. Down two at halftime, NJIT began with possession and Flores drove to the bucket for a score 12 seconds into the half.
 
Seton Hall's Edwin then found Pope for a layup and he was fouled as his shot put the Pirates back on top, 36-34. However, Pope, who misfired on four of his first six free throws before making the last two, missed on the bid for the 3-point play and Wilkerson rebounded the missed foul shot. Sixteen seconds later, Wilkerson drove along the baseline for another layup to tie the score at 36 with 19:16 left in the game.
 
That's when things got away. Seton Hall made five of its next six shots in a span of 3:04. And NJIT would not make another field goal until Wilkerson scored at the 6:56 mark, with the only Highlander points in the 12:20 between baskets being two free throws for Woods when Seton Hall's Pope was assessed a technical foul for hanging on the rim after a dunk at 14:42.
 
Between Wilkerson's tying basket at 19:16 and his next basket at 6:56, Seton Hall had outscored the Highlanders, 29-2.
 
That dry spell, too, echoed the second half against Georgetown, when NJIT didn't get its first points until 6:16 into the second half and didn't get its first field goal of the half until the 10:55 mark.
 
The second-half team statistics were telling.
 
NJIT's shot 4-for-25 from the field, including 1-for-15 from distance over the last 20 minutes. Where the first-half rebounding was even, Seton Hall had nine second-chance points in the second half after getting just two in the first half and finished with a 40-32 lead in final team rebounding.
 
After committing just four turnovers in the first half, the Highlanders had 11 in the second half. Seton Hall, with six first-half turnovers made three in the second half and the final points-off-of-turnovers were 24-3 overall for the Pirates, 16-1 in the second half.
 
As the academic calendar turns to final exams and the end of the semester, NJIT has just one game between now and December 22, when it visits its third, and final, BIG EAST foe of the year, Rutgers.
 
The next game for NJIT is a home contest on Monday, December 12 at 7 pm in the Estelle and Zoom Fleisher Athletic Center against St. Joseph's of New York.