Box Score HONOLULU – The Chaminade University men's basketball team is starting to pick up some steam again after last week's tough road trip.
For the second consecutive game, the Silverswords shot over 50 percent from the floor and hit double-digits in 3-pointers as they upended Holy Names at McCabe Gym on Saturday, 101-83.
Chaminade (15-11 overall, 12-6 Pacific West Conference) shot 51.5 percent from the floor and hit 10 treys against Holy Names (5-21, 4-14)
Kiran Shastri led the charge for the 'Swords, coming off the bench for a second-straight game, hitting for a game-high 24 points while hitting five 3-pointers.
Kuany Kuany had 14 points before fouling out while
Tyree Harrison had 11 points and nine rebounds.
Lee Bailey scored 13 points for the Silverswords, giving him 1,072 career points, moving him into a tie for 10
th in school history with Darnell Clavon.
Chaminade pulled within one game of Dominican University of California for the No. 3 seed for the upcoming PacWest Tournament in San Diego and also stayed one game ahead of BYU-Hawai'i for the fourth seed. The Silverswords and Seasiders meet on Thursday.
Chaminade charged out of the gates early, establishing a double-digit lead some six minutes into the game, grabbing a 17-6 advantage on
Kevin Hu's bucket. The lead swelled to 21 via a 19-9 run and, eventually, the 'Swords built the lead to a 61-35 halftime advantage.
The Silverswords shot 55 percent from the floor while holding the Hawks to 38.2 and easily controlled the glass, 29-13. They also committed only five turnovers.
Emerging from the locker room after halftime, Chaminade continued its hot shooting, getting buckets from
James Harper, Kuany, Bailey and treys by Shastri and
Rhys Murphy as the lead swelled to 73-41, its largest of the game.
The Hawks slowly ate away at the deficit, although the 'Swords still held a 21-point advantage, 86-65, with 9:10 remaining. But then a 9-0 run over the next two minutes, aided by three turnovers, brought Holy Names to within 12 at 86-74, prompting a Chaminade timeout, making the White Out Night T-shirt crowd and young fans from the Boys and Girls Club of Honolulu feel uneasy.
But the home team responded out of the timeout, as Harrison scored five straight, which sparked a 14-0 run to get the lead back into the 20s, effectively putting the game away.
Despite the 18-point margin of victory, Silverswords head coach
Eric Bovaird was quick to point out the team's second-half shortcomings.
"We played a great first half, we played tough defense, we were smart with the ball," Bovaird said. "But I was very disappointed in the second half. They beat us, 48-40 (in second-half scoring). We ended up with 15 turnovers in the (second) half… you're going to lose to the really good teams if that's the stat line, so we need some things to we need to work on."
Thursday's contest against BYUH is Free Hot Dog Night, courtesy of the Chaminade Board of Regents, for current CUH students who arrive at the game and show a current valid ID.
The game will also be carried via streaming audio on goswords.com.
