Western Kentucky men’s basketball coach Rick Stansbury got to see his potential depth firsthand in Saturday’s 88-68 exhibition win over Georgetown College at E.A. Diddle Arena.

In a game where the NAIA school hung around for around 30 minutes, it was a late push sparked by the bench that allowed WKU to pull away. Western Kentucky closed with a 29-2 run, including 19 straight at one point to make it two exhibition wins in four days.

Birthday boy Dontaie Allen sparked the Hilltoppers with 18 points off the bench, helping the WKU bench outscore Georgetown’s bench 37-10.

“Overall, and y’all have heard me say this several times, the key to your team is 6-7-8-9 and 10 – how those guys come in and add to it,” Stansbury said. “When you’ve got those guys coming off the bench and adding to it like ours, that is going to help your team in the long run for sure.”

Georgetown went toe-to-toe with WKU until the Hilltoppers finally found another gear in the final 10 minutes. The game was tied 38-all at halftime, with the Tigers leading by as many as four points in the second half – the final time at 63-59 after a bucket from Jaquay Wales with 10:21 remaining.

WKU finally took the lead for good with 10 straight from the bench – 3-pointers from Allen and Khristian Lander and back-to-back buckets by Tyrone Marshall.

“That second group from the 15-minute to the 10-minute mark in the second half, they gave us some energy,” WKU redshirt senior guard Luke Frampton said. “We got up 10 and it was a wrap there.

“That second group got us going. They had energy … we started playing hard and it showed.”

A Georgetown bucket briefly stopped the momentum, but the Hilltoppers would outscore the Tigers 19-0 over the next six minutes to take their largest lead at 88-65 with 1:53 left.

“I thought we wore them down,” Stansbury said. “That second bunch came in, probably played six or seven minutes straight. I don’t know what the difference was in the score, but they separated the score. They brought great energy.”

Allen was one of four Hilltoppers to finish in double figures.

Jairus Hamilton finished with 17 points. Dayvion McKnight added 14 points and eight rebounds, Frampton chipped in 12 points, while Jordan Rawls added eight points and eight assists – seven assists in the second half.

“I think the biggest thing was we crowded around each other and decided, ‘You know what, we are going to fight. We are not going to give up,’ ” Allen said. “I just wanted that one. I’m glad we got the (win).”

WKU was without Emmanuel Akot and Jaylen Dorsey, who were both out due to illness.

The Hilltoppers open the regular season at Eastern Kentucky at 6 p.m. CST on Thursday.

Jones returns to BG

Former Bowling Green High School standout Kyran Jones made his return to Diddle Arena for Georgetown in Saturday’s game, finishing with 11 points and nine rebounds.

It was the first time Jones has played in Diddle Arena since 2017 when the Purples beat Russellville for the Region 4 championship. Bowling Green would go on to win the program’s first state title.

“Just to be able to see my mom and family and fans from Bowling Green, you can’t beat that,” Jones said. “We have a special team capable of winning a championship this year, so this was a test for us. We were able to see where we are at and I think we set a bar for us.”

Jones was an NAIA All-American last season for Georgetown. He averaged 14.4 points and 10.7 rebounds, recording his 1,000th career point in February. Georgetown finished 24-8, falling in the opening round of the NAIA National Championship.

Jones said Saturday’s game was a good test for the team going forward.

“We were able to see our mistakes,” Jones said. “We are probably not going to see a big 7-5 dude again this year. That’s good for us to be able to see that – two guys 6-7 and up. We don’t really see that in NAIA. We know we can go up from here.”{&end}