HAVERFORD, Pa. – The Ursinus Men's Basketball team overcame a halftime deficit and defeated Haverford 72-66 on the road on Wednesday evening in Centennial Conference action.
 
With the win, the Bears won their fourth-straight game to improve to 14-6 overall and 9-4 in Centennial Conference action. Meanwhile, the Fords dropped to 7-13 overall in 5-8 conference play.
 
 
Junior Trevor Wall paced all scorers on the floor with 19 points behind going 7-of-13 from the field and 3-of-5 from deep. Wall added four assists, three rebounds, and one steal in the win as well. Senior Ryan Hughes posted 17 points on 5-of-9 from the field, two assists, and one rebound whole sophomore Cole Grubbs narrowly missed a double-double with 13 points plus eight rebounds.
 
 
A competitive first half saw the teams trade the lead 10 times in the first 6:24 of the game and the advantage did not go above more than two points. The Fords took advantage of a 3+ minute scoreless stretch for the Bears and went up 18-14 at the 10:21-mark of the first half. The Bears pulled within one point at 20-19 with 8:10 remaining in the first half but got no closer the first half as Haverford used a 12-6 run to lead 32-25 at the break.
 
 
Haverford took its largest lead of the game at 37-29 with 18:48 left in regulation before the Bears used a quick 6-0 burst to pull within 37-35. The Fords were able to stretch their lead back out to seven at 47-40 with 13:20 left in regulation before Ursinus seized control of the game with a 23-2 run to go up 62-49 at the 3:42 mark. The Bears held Haverford to one field goal in a span of 10:55 which included a stretch of 7:05 without a single point. Meanwhile, Ursinus went 8-of-11 from the field in that same stretch. The Fords got within four points at 70-66 with 21 seconds remaining, but Hughes knocked down a pair of free throws to ice the game.
 
 
The Bears went 51 percent (26-of-51) from the field behind going 62.5 percent in the second half and 33 percent (5-of-15) from three-point range. Ursinus shot 75 percent (15-of-20) from the free throw line and forced 17 Haverford turnovers. Meanwhile, the Fords shot 36.1 percent (22-of-61) from the field after going just 28.6 percent in the second half. Haverford went 8-of-27 (29.6%) from deep and a solid 77.8 percent (14-of-18) from the free throw line. The Fords also held a 37-31 rebounding advantage which led to a 12-0 edge in second chance points.
 
 
Ryan Trotter and Dhruv Mehrotra led the Fords with 11 points apiece while Brandon Banadda narrowly missed a double double with 10 points and eight rebounds.
 
 
Ursinus returns to action on Saturday, February 4th as they will travel to Gettysburg for a key Centennial Conference matchup with Gettysburg at 3:00 p.m.