LEXINGTON, Va. – Though the game was close at the half, the Wofford men's basketball team outscored VMI 50-33 in the second half to cruise past VMI 81-63 on the road on Wednesday evening. With the win, Wofford improves to 15-15 overall and 10-7 in Southern Conference play, while VMI falls to 6-21 on the season and 3-13 in conference action. Wofford has won eight in a row over VMI and has clinched a first round bye in the Southern Conference tournament with the win.
After surpassing 1,200 career points and 500 career assists in Wofford's last game over Western Carolina, senior point guard
Eric Garcia recorded nine assists tonight to pass
Drew Gibson for second all-time in assists and is the D1 leader in the same category. Garcia has 204 assists on the season and is the first Southern Conference player to surpass 200 assists in a season since Davidson's Jason Richards in 2008. The 204 assists this season puts him third for assists in a season by a Wofford player. Garcia is one assist shy of joining the top 10 for most assists in a season by a SoCon player.
Fletcher Magee led Wofford in scoring with 24 points, 19 of which came in the second half. Magee was 8-13 from the floor, 6-10 from three point range and 2-2 from the line in 36 minutes of action. Magee's six three's on the night gave him 99 on the season and broke Wofford's record for most three pointers made in a season, set by Karl Cochran (98) in 2014-15.
Virginia native
Cameron Jackson followed with 20 points, six rebounds and two blocks. He was 9-13 from the field. Jackson has scored 45 points against the Keydets this season as the sophomore scored a career high 25 in the first meeting of the season on Jan. 19.
"It was great to get to play in front of my family and I'm really glad I played well," said Jackson. " I got some good passes from the guards and they made it easy for me to go up and score the ball without doing anything complex."
Ryan Sawvell had a nice night, finishing with 12 points and nine rebounds, just one rebound shy of his fourth double-double in the last five games.
Nathan Hoover was the fourth Terrier in double figures with 10 points. In addition to his nine assists, Garcia added nine points.
VMI quickly jumped out to a 4-0 lead to start the game and led by as many as seven with four minutes left but Wofford went on an 11-3 run to close the half and take a slight 31-30 lead into the half.
After shooting just 39.4% in the first half of play, the Terriers shot 66.7% in the second half. Wofford had just four threes in the first half and doubled that in the second. VMI made four baskets out of the half to keep it close, but the Terriers took a 42-41 lead with 16:04 left in the game and didn't look back, stretching the lead to as many as 20 with a minute to go in the contest.
Wofford concludes the regular season on Saturday at Furman. Tipoff is set for 2:00 p.m. in Timmons Arena. The Southern Conference tournament takes place March 3-6 in Asheville, N.C.
