Grand Canyon finishes 3rd, rolls past CSU Bakersfield 81-68

Mar 3, 2018, 11:32 pm

PHOENIX -- Alessandro Lever put up 23 points and Grand Canyon closed out the regular season with a convincing 81-68 win over CSU Bakersfield on Saturday night.

The Antelopes had looked to Seattle to upset Utah Valley in the final game of the regular season, allowing them to slide up into the No. 2 seed, but the Wolverines rolled to a 73-47 win to clinch.

Grand Canyon (20-10, 9-5) now enters the Western Athletic Conference Tournament as the No. 3 seed in the eight-team tourney and will play the No. 6 seed in the first of four quarterfinal games Thursday at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas. CSU Bakersfield finishes tied with UMKC for the No. 6 seed into the tournament. The teams split their regular season series.

The Antelopes took the lead two minutes into the game and rolled to a 21-7 lead eight minutes in and never looked back.

Joshua Braun and Casey Benson scored 14 and 13 points, respectively, for Grand Canyon and Oscar Frayer added 10.

Rickey Holden scored 19 points to lead the Roadrunners (12-17, 5-9) with Damiyne Durham and Moataz Aly adding 13 and 12 points, respectively, with Justin Davis contributing 11.