Dwight Coleby fumed on the bench Thursday night.

Coleby, Western Kentucky’s 6-foot-9 graduate senior power forward and de facto primary post defender, had just picked up two fouls in quick succession and had to come out of a tight contest against Conference USA rival Alabama-Birmingham in front of a boisterous home crowd at E.A. Diddle Arena.

As Coleby sat with three fouls, the Tops’ fortunes sank against the Blazers. What had been a tie game at 40-all seemed to be slipping away as UAB (13-6 overall, 4-2 C-USA) began to feast on WKU’s interior defense. The Blazers grabbed the lead and extended it to seven, which is where matters stood when Coleby got another chance with just less than 12 minutes to play.

“I started to get angry, then I started to try and see what I was doing wrong in the game, try to figure out, ‘OK, this is what I need to do to get better when I get back on the court,’ “ Coleby said of his time on the bench. “So when I got back on the court, I knew what I needed to do and it worked out. I was in the right positions to help my team win.”

Coleby’s return solidified the Tops’ defense in the paint as he decisively helped cut off the Blazers’ steady torrent of high-percentage points with stretches of pure defensive dominance around the rim.

Coleby finished with 17 points and 11 rebounds, plus added four blocks in his 30 minutes of action to help the Hilltoppers rally and then pull away for a 77-69 victory. The win left them in sole possession of first place in the C-USA standings with another huge home conference game coming up at 6 p.m. Saturday against Middle Tennessee.

“I didn’t think he played very great – you look at the stats, he’s 17 and 11,” WKU coach Rick Stansbury said of Coleby. “Pretty good stats and that was some pretty good guys he was going against tonight.”

The Blazers entered Thursday’s game with a well-earned reputation for owning the inside. In particular, senior forward Chris Cokley has averaged a near double-double for the season. As Stansbury said afterward, the 6-8, 238-pounder “is a load in there.”

Cokley is the one who got Coleby into foul trouble in the second half, and Stansbury wasn’t having any more of that. He switched senior Justin Johnson to that crucial defensive assignment, freeing up Coleby to patrol under the rim.

“He wasn’t very good the first five minutes of the second half,” Stansbury said of Coleby. “But to his credit, he came back and was a man. We made a switch down that stretch a little bit too, and put Justin on Cokley – trying to save Dwight in foul trouble. I thought Justin did a great job on him. Justin’s got great instincts, can see things happening a little quicker, knows how to frame a little bit.

“Sometimes Dwight’s lack of playing experience, he don’t see that next play happen quite as quick before it happens as a guy like Justin. But he was a man there in the second half. “

Coleby’s backup, redshirt sophomore Moustapha Diagne was tentative in his 10 minutes of action with a distinct drop-off in both scoring and as a defender – which makes sense, considering it was only his third-ever Division I game.

Having Coleby helped on both ends of the court as he played an integral role in Stansbury’s drive and pound strategy. With WKU’s guards having a collective off night from the field, that ploy helped the Hilltoppers stay even with the Blazers on points in the paint and enjoy a decisive advantage at the free-throw line where they sank 20-of-29 attempts while UAB managed just 3-of-3 free throws.

Coleby hit 7-of-8 from the free-throw line and was 5-of-7 from the field as he joined Johnson (18 points, eight rebounds) as the driving forces in the Hilltoppers’ seventh straight win. The double-double was the eighth this season for Coleby, who tallied only one career double-double in his first three years of college basketball at Ole Miss and then Kansas. The four blocked shots tied Coleby’s season high, which he’s accomplished five times already.

Coleby even broke out a finger wag on one of those second-half swats, just a reminder that on Thursday night the rim belonged to him.

“I think that was my first time ever trying it,” Coleby said. “I was caught up in the moment. It was like on the bucket list. I had to do it.”{&end}