Miners heat up in second half to ground Eagles

Justin Taylor

The Miners turned the tables on their shooting in the second half Wednesday, overcoming a ragged first half to connect on two-third of their field goal attempts -- and six-of-seven from three-point range -- to come away with a 78-69 win over Robert Morris-Springfield at the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building.

UMR made only 35.3 percent of its shots in the opening half while the visiting Eagles were good on 51.7 percent of their tries to build a 37-32 lead at the intermission. However, the Miners set the tone of the second half by scoring the first nine points in a two-minute span to take a 41-37 lead.

After the Eagles caught up at 44 on a layup by Corley Lee with 16:08 to go, the teams swapped the lead for the next three minutes. UMR trailed 56-55 before Owain Hall's three-pointer at the 12:43 mark trigged a decisive 15-0 run that gave UMR a 70-56 advantage by the 8:16 mark.

The Miners were able to break the game open with a pair of three-pointers by Justin Taylor and baskets by Aaron Hays, Andrew James and Hall to build their biggest lead of the night. During the course of the run, the Miners forced nine consecutive missed shots from the field from the Eagles.

Taylor in particular heated up in the second half as he scored 20 of his game-high 25 points after the intermission, including connecting on all four of his three-point attempts. UMR also got 15 points apiece from Hall and Hays, as the three Miner guards combined to go 19-of-37 from the floor and hit nine of the Miners' season-high 10 three-pointers.

Taylor also surpassed the 20-point mark for the third straight game, the first Miner to do so since Jermaine Burks had five straight 20-point outings to close the 2004-05 campaign.

UMR made 16 of its 24 second half shots (66.7 percent) to finish the night at 48.3 percent. It also held the Eagles, who were led in scoring by Tyler Moretto with 19 points, to 33.3 percent after the break and 41.5 percent for the night while outrebounding the Eagles 43-32.

The Miners (3-4) will host Lincoln in a 2 p.m. game Saturday at the Bullman Multi-Purpose Building.