WAYNE, N.J. – The No. 18 TCNJ men's basketball team debuted its new national ranking in emphatic fashion on Tuesday night, rolling to a 95-55 road win at William Paterson in the NJAC opener.
 
Five players scored between 12 and 17 points for the Lions (6-0, 1-0), who joined the D3hoops.com Top-25 for the first time in 20 years and announced their intentions to stick around with a relentless performance to begin conference play.
 
It was a game of extended runs for TCNJ, which trailed 20-13 midway through the first half before embarking on a 16-0 spurt to turn the tables. Leading 38-29 at half, the blue and gold ran off the first 15 points of the second stanza and went on to outscore the Pioneers by 31 in the period.
 
Nick Koch had had a game-high 17 points and added six assists for the Lions, while Matthew Okorie paired 16 points with eight rebounds. Jonathan Okocha netted 15 points; Matthew Solomon registered 14 points, six boards, and five assists; and Jack Vreeswyk finished with 12 markers for TCNJ.
 
The Lions were down seven after 10 minutes, but kept the Pioneers off the board for more than six minutes to put their stamp on the night. Okocha tied the game at 20 with a 3-pointer before Solomon put TCNJ in front for good with a bucket inside, eventually capping the spurt by putting back a missed free throw.
 
TCNJ blitzed WPU to start the second half, getting a 3-pointer from Solomon and back-to-back long balls from Vreeswyk to push the lead to 20 at 49-29. Okocha and Vreeswyk added baskets before the Pioneers finally ended a five-plus minute drought, by which time the game was already out of hand.
 
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE

• TCNJ shot 45.9 percent from the field and knocked down 12 3-pointers while holding WPU to just 2-of-15 from long distance
• The Lions forced 20 Pioneer turnovers and converted them into 29 points
• The Lions racked up a 46-29 advantage on the boards and produced 23 second-chance points
• TCNJ had 21 assists to just 11 turnovers

NOTES

• TCNJ matched its season high in assists, and has produced more assists than turnovers in all but one game
• The 40-point win matched a 106-66 rout of Rutgers-Camden on November 22, 2016 for the largest margin of victory in an NJAC game since a 92-45 win against Camden on February 2, 2005
• Okorie moved past graduate assistant and former teammate Danny Bodine '23 for 24th on the program's all-time rebounding list (352)
• Shaun Johnson (3) and Chris Santner (2) scored their first points of the season, while Nick Seeloch made a 3-pointer for his first collegiate points

UP NEXT

• The Lions have over a week off before returning home to take on Stockton on December 4