Box Score
EDMOND (Feb. 24) -- Another amazing performance by Dauntae Williams and splendid outings by a pair of seniors playing their final home game carried Central Oklahoma to a 109-79 thumping of Lone Star Conference North Division rival East Central Wednesday night at Hamilton Field House.
Williams had his second triple-double of the season with a dominating 23-point, 14-rebound, 12-assist masterpiece, while Eric Cazenave had a season-high 20 points with a career-high 11 assists and Keith Marks a career-best 15 points with six rebounds in their home finale.
The Bronchos got off to a horrid start and actually trailed by 15 points (32-17) with 8:50 left in the opening half before hitting three straight 3-point bombs to trigger a blistering 31-7 run that resulted in a 48-39 halftime lead.
UCO finally put the pesky Tigers away with an 12-0 second-half spurt and made it a rout down the stretch in winning for the 17th time in 18 outings.
The Bronchos improved to 21-5 overall and stayed tied with Northeastern State for the LSC North lead at 10-1. UCO ends the regular season Saturday at Southeastern Oklahoma, needing a win to clinch at least a share of its third straight league title.
"East Central came out ready to play and we didn't," head coach Terry Evans said. "We missed a lot of shots and they got after us in the first 10 minutes, but we finally settled down and played pretty well the rest of the game."
UCO connected on just six of its first 23 shots in falling into its 15-point hole, but ended up shooting a solid 47.7 percent (41-of-86) for the game while making 17 treys.
Shane Carroll also had a superb game for the Bronchos, hitting six 3-pointers in scoring 27 points, while Carl Curry had eight points and a career-high 10 rebounds.
UCO got a game-opening bucket from Marks in taking a quick 2-0 lead, but the run-and-gun Tigers quickly moved in front and soon upped their lead to 15 at 32-17 with 8:50 left in the half.
The Bronchos finally got untracked, ripping off 14 unanswered points in less than three minutes as Carroll nailed a couple of long-range 3-pointers, Cazenave swished a trey from the wing and Williams converted a three-point play to get UCO within one at 32-31 with 6:04 remaining.
Marks put the Bronchos ahead to stay with a 3-pointer at the 3:58 mark that made it 36-34 and UCO went on to stretch its lead to nine (48-39) by the break when Cazenave drained a long-range dagger from the corner with five seconds left.
Another Cazenave trey to open the second half made it 51-39, but ECU didn't go away and the Tigers were within four at 63-59 with 12:54 remaining. The Bronchos finally took control with a 12-0 run, getting six points from Carroll in the spurt that made it 75-59 with 10:13 left and UCO continued to pull away after that.
