With an explosive start to its three-game homestand, the George Mason men’s basketball team scored quickly and cruised to a 89-63 Colonial Athletic Association victory over Delaware on Wednesday night at the Patriot Center. Mason’s win keeps the Patriots atop the conference standings at 6-1 (14-5 overall), while the Blue Hens dropped to 3-4 in the CAA and 7-10 overall.
A pair of Mason seniors led the way, as Ryan Pearson posted his seventh double-double of the season with game-highs of 24 points and 10 rebounds. Classmate Mike Morrison added 17 points and seven rebounds while sophomore Bryon Allen chipped in 12. Mason out-shot the Blue Hens by a 54.4-to-36.7 percent margin and turned UD over 16 times, compared to eight turnovers for the Patriots. Devon Saddler led the Blue Hens with 21 points.
Mason opened with a 10-2 run spanning more than three and a half minutes, which was part of a larger stretch which saw the Patriots build a 16-4 lead with just over five minutes expired off the clock. A 3-pointer by Saddler at the 14:33 mark stopped the scoring spree, and the Blue Hens closed the gap to four just over three minutes later.
The Patriots answered with seven straight to push their advantage to 27-16, but the Blue Hens responded with a 7-0 run to cut it to 27-23 with 6:35 left in the opening half.
Leading 33-26, Mason exploded for eight of the next nine to make the score 41-27 with three minutes remaining in the first half, and eventually took its largest lead of the first 20 minutes into the halftime locker room as Allen drained a 3-pointer as the horn sounded, giving the Patriots a 46-31 lead.
It matched Mason’s highest-scoring first half of the season in the win at College of Charleston. Pearson and Morrison led the way with 13 and 12 points, respectively, in the first half.
Delaware cut the advantage to nine with an 11-5 start to the second half less than four minutes in, but it would be the closest the Blue Hens could get as the margin stayed in double figures for the duration of the game, with the Patriots going on to lead by as many as 29 points inside the final minute of play.
Mason is back in action on Saturday afternoon, hosting Towson at 4 p.m. in a game that will be broadcast live on Comcast SportsNet.
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