WATCH GAME HIGHLIGHTS


DURHAM, NC—North Carolina Central University took control of its men's basketball game against visiting NJIT from the outset and the Eagles were never seriously threatened on the way to a 71-55 victory over the Highlanders Thursday in NCCU's McDougald-McLendon Gymnasium.

NCCU, now 10-5 overall and unbeaten in six home games, made seven of its first nine shots in taking a 14-7 lead in the opening five minutes. And it wasn't a matter of spectacular shooting—five of the Eagles' opening buckets were layups and one was a short jump shot in the lane.

After falling behind 12-2 early, NJIT stayed reasonably close for a time, thanks to the 3-point shooting of Damon Lynn, who made three 3-pointers from the 14:53 mark to 12:42, providing the Highlanders with their only points in the that span. The third triple drew the Highlanders as close as they would get over the game's final 37:35, when his deep shot trimmed the deficit to 18-13 with 12:42 left in the first half.

Lynn finished with a game-high 19 points for NJIT, which dropped to 8-11 on the season at the end of a brief two-game winning streak. No other Highlander managed more than six points. Lynn, the shortest NJIT starter at 5-foot-11, led the Highlanders on the boards with six rebounds.

NC Central's balanced scoring was headed by junior Jordan Parks, who netted 14 points on 6-for-8 shooting in 12 minutes play off the bench. Parks, who had some highlight reel dunks, also made 3 steals, leading an Eagle defense that stole the ball 14 times on the night, the most this season by an NJIT foe.

Jay Copeland, a powerful 6-foot-7, 255-pound redshirt junior, finished with a double-double (13 points and 10 rebounds) and senior guard Jeremy Ingram, who came in averaging a team-best 19.9 points per game, added 10 points on Thursday.

A breakdown of the team statistics provided an accurate picture of what the game looked like.

Although the Eagles are not an extraordinarily big team, they outscored NJIT in the paint, 40-10.

On defense, NCCU disrupted the Highlanders, with 14 steals keying 22 NJIT turnovers, the second-highest total this season for the visitors. The final points-off-turnovers favored the Eagles, 22-8.

In the first half, especially, the winners' halfcourt defense pushed NJIT out so high that the Highlanders found themselves running plays 25 feet from the basket. They wound up taking 11 3-point shots compared to nine tries inside the arc over the opening 20 minutes. Smith, the top inside threat for NJIT all year (12.2 ppg coming in) only got one first-half shot, which he made.

The first-half points-off-turnovers were 12-0 and the team rebounding was 22-10. The Eagles' 10 offensive rebounds matched the combined offense-defense total for the Highlanders in the opening half.

North Carolina Central took its biggest lead of the first half, 36-19, on two Emmanuel Chapman foul shots with 55 seconds left. But NJIT got a jump shot from Winfield Willis for his only basket of the game and Lynn hit a 25-foot 3-pointer just ahead of the buzzer to make the halftime score 36-24.

Although they barely dented the 12-point halftime deficit, the Highlanders played their most competitive ball of the night early in the second half and cut the deficit to 11 five different times/ The last came at 46-35 on a Smith basket with 14:06 remaining. Nigel Sydnor assisted on the play and the sophomore also made two baskets on halfcourt drives, a rarity for the Highlanders in the game, in the first 4:55 of the second half.

But the early competitive spell for NJIT leading up to the Smith basket gave way to an 8-0 Eagle run that included four points for Ingram and four for Parks on a pair of dunks.

The 8-0 run sparked a longer 20-4 stretch for NCCU, which got its lead in the 20s in the process. The Eagles took their biggest advantage of the night. 70-42, on an Alfonzo Houston fast-break layup with 4:29 remaining.

NJIT finished off the remaining time 13-1 to make the final score a bit closer at 71-55. Nine of the points came on two 3-pointers for freshman Rob Ukawuba and one for classmate Jake Duncan.

North Carolina's ability to impose defensive control wasn't unusual for the Eagles, who came in holding their opponents to 38.1 percent shooting overall and 62.7 points per game. Those totals came despite playing on the road at big-time programs such as Cincinnati, North Carolina State (an 82-72 overtime win for the Eagles, the first ever for NC State in 30 tries against a team from NCCU's Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference), and Wichita State, now ranked fifth in the nation with a 17-0 record.

NJIT continues its trip to North Carolina with another game against a MEAC team on Saturday at 7 pm. The Highlanders visit North Carolina A&T in Greensboro. A&T was 20-17 last season, including a 76-71 win in Newark on December 13, 2012. The Aggies went on to capture the 2013 MEAC Tournament, which was good for an automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament.