FINAL SCORE: Louisiana Tech 68, Western Kentucky 65

RECORDS:
Western Kentucky “Hilltoppers” — 5-12 overall, 3-3 Sun Belt Conference
Louisiana Tech "Bulldogs" — 12-5 overall, 4-2 Sun Belt Conference

PLAY-BY-PLAY HIGHLIGHTS:
First Half — Curtis Williams opens the scoring with a layup at 19:03 ...
Derek Robinson gets Western on the board at 18:35 with a driving layup tying
the score 2-2 — he would score seven of the Toppers’ first 10 points ...
Hilltoppers extend lead to 7-2 on Robinson three with 16:02 left ... Trailing
10-6, Tech comes back to take lead with five straight points — Craig Jackson
putback makes it 11-10 with 12:35 to go ... Western regains lead 15-13 when
Filip Videnov makes a driving layup for his first basket at 7:48 ... Nashon
McPherson three-pointer with 5:56 remaining give WKU lead until final
half-minute of half (20-17) ... Western has six-point lead on two occasions —
the last when David Boyden makes 12-foot jumper in the lane for Hilltoppers’
final points of half to make it 26-20 with 2:18 to go ... Jackson scores final
five points of half in last 1:07, tying score on three from right wing with 33
seconds remaining ... Bulldogs commit just two turnovers.

Second Half — Chris Marcus gives the Toppers an early two-point lead out of
the break with a basket at 19:36 and Western its last lead (30-28) on a
turnaround jumper with 18:25 remaining ... Gerrod Henderson — who scored the
Bulldogs first nine points of the half — gives Tech the lead for good at 33-30
on a three-pointer from the right wing with 17:06 left ... Lee Lampley ends
7-0 Tech run with spinning shot in lane at 16:07 (35-32) ... Leading 37-34,
Bulldogs score next six points to take a nine-point lead with 14:33 to go ...
Marcus keeps Western in the game with seven straight points — Tech leads 49-41
with 12:09 left ... Bulldogs take largest lead of night at 61-48 with 7:37
remaining on Jackson’s layup ... Trailing 65-55 with 3:45 left, Toppers score
seven unanswered points over 2:46 span to pull to 65-62 at 0:34 ... Marcus
scores four points and Lampley adds three-pointer during spurt ... Henderson
makes 1 of 2 free throws to give Bulldogs 66-62 advantage with 34 seconds left
... Kendrick Spruel dunk at 0:19 gives Tech final points ... Videnov hits
three-pointer at 0:14 to close scoring.

QUOTES:
WKU Head Coach Dennis Felton — “We made a major step as a team tonight. ...
We played the game on our terms. ... We defended well most of the game. But,
we made a major step towards poise on offense. ... Our turnovers were too high
in the first half. ... Down the stretch, I told them during our timeouts to
make them guard us. ... We credit Tech. They made big shots to overcome us.
... A lot of good things came out of this game. I feel better about our team
after this loss than any other time this season.”

Tech Head Coach Keith Richard — “I envisioned it being this type of game
coming up here. We’ve been a Jeckyl-and-Hyde club on the road all year. ...
I’m happy with this game, but at times we almost gave it away. ... I thought
we defended very well. Lampley’s seven points are a credit to our team
defense. ... We actually made some changes to control our offense. We usually
run a very fast type of game, but I thought we needed to slow it down going on
the road.”

NOTES — Marcus collects second straight double-double and fifth of the
season, scores career-high 18 points ... Marcus and Henderson each score all
but one of their points in the second half ... Tech has a WKU-opponent low
five turnovers ... Tech’s fifth win in 11 meetings in Ruston — the Bulldogs
also won last season’s regular-season contest at Diddle Arena ... Loss snaps
Western’s four-game home win streak.

NEXT GAME — Western concludes a four-game Sun Belt homestand against
Louisiana-Lafayette Saturday at 7 p.m. CST ... Tech completes a two-game,
three-day SBC road trip at Florida International in Miami on Saturday at 7
p.m. (EST)