The No. 9 ranked Emory University men's basketball team returned to the WoodPEC on Thursday afternoon for its first regular season matchup of the season. The Eagles dominated with a 15-point victory over the Huntingdon Hawks and were led by 27 points from senior Jair Knight, the second best of his career.
Reaching a career high against the Hawks was junior Ethan Fauss who earned a double-double with 13 points and a career-high 12 rebounds while the Eagles had five players reach double-digit points.
"It was great to be back home to play a home game," head coach Jason Zimmerman. "It's been a while since we played here in the WoodPEC so it was nice to be back home."
The first half set the pace for the game as Emory outscored Huntingdon 56-36 in the first 20 minutes of play. Teammates Ben Pearce and AJ Harris combined for 13 points in the first 10 minutes pushing the Eagles to a 32-15 lead. Knight and Pearce were rolling on offense and were helped by sophomore Mario Awasum and Fauss to take a 20-point lead into the break.
"I think we did a great job in the first half of playing unselfish basketball. I think we had 15 assists in the first half alone. That really set the tone for the game offensively and we also rebounded off the backboard really well in the first half. Those two things really set the tone for the night and we're excited to move on and get better from this one," Zimmerman concluded.
Emory reached its biggest lead of the game five minutes into the second half with a jumper from Knight giving the Eagles a 27-point, 73-46 advantage. The Hawks offense came alive going on a 14-4 run in the next five minutes before Fauss broke the scoring drought for Emory. Mistakes from Huntingdon allowed the Eagles to take advantage of free throws in the final nine minutes clinching the 93-78 victory.