ABILENE –
Austin Cooke poured in a career-high 22 points and
Harrison Hawkins continued his tremendous play on the offensive end of the floor Sunday afternoon as the ACU Wildcats opened Southland Conference play with an 87-70 win over Central Arkansas at Moody Coliseum.
The win evens the Wildcats' overall mark at 7-7 and they improve to 1-0 in the Southland Conference, while the Bears drop to 0-12 overall and 0-1 in the league. ACU is off until Saturday when it hosts Nicholls at 4 p.m. at Moody Coliseum.
The first half was a bit of a back-and-forth affair until the last six minutes when ACU turned a one-point lead into a nine-point lead with an 8-0 run. Hawkins hit back-to-back 3-pointers before
Jalen Little hit a layup on a feed from Hawkins to make it 33-24 with 4:09 left in the half. The Bears were able to cut the Wildcats' lead to 38-34 with 16 seconds to play, but
Parker Wentz buried a 3-pointer with six seconds left on a feed from Little to make it a 41-34 game at halftime.
"I thought that 3-pointer from Parker before the end of the first half was a big shot for us," ACU head coach
Joe Golding said. "It gave us a chance to settle down a little bit and get a little bit of separation going into halftime."
Cooke – whose previous career-high was 14 points – had more than those 14 points in the 30-13 run that started the second half and pushed the Wildcats' lead to 24 points (71-47) with 10:43 to play. Cooke had 15 points in the run,
LaDarrien Williams had seven, Hawkins had five points and Wentz a 3-pointer as ACU opened a big lead.
With the lead at 10 points (46-36), Cooke hit three straight 3-pointers on assists from Little to push the lead to 55-38 with 16:40 to play. That seemed to be the key stretch in the run as Cooke found the range from beyond the arc. He finished 5 of 11 from the field, including 4 of 7 from 3-point range, and also hit all eight of his free throws.
"I thought 'Cookie' played well," Golding said. "There was a key stretch early in the second half where we were able to get some stops and then hit him on two or three straight possessions, and he was able to knock down some shots."
UCA wouldn't go away as the Bears were able to cut the lead to 12 points on a couple of occasions inside the final five minutes before Hawkins hit a pair of free throws and a a layup, Williams hit a couple of free throws and Little a pair of free throws with 28 seconds to play to make the final 87-70.
With his 22 points Sunday, Hawkins has scored 75 points in the Wildcats' last four games since moving back into the starting lineup. Williams has come off the bench in the last four games and with his 16 points on Sunday he's averaging 15.5 points per game in those four contests.
The Wildcats shot a blistering 53.7 percent from the field Sunday (29 of 54), including 11 of 18 from 3-point range (61.1 percent).
