Falcons pull away from Concord

It was a tale of two halves that ended well for senior forward Will Voorhees and Notre Dame College.

Trailing, 49-40, at halftime, the host Falcons rallied in the second half behind Voorhees’ scoring and much tighter defense to pull away to a 86-76 victory over Concord (W.Va.) at Murphy Gymnasium.

Voorhees scored 23 of his game-high 33 points in the second half as the Falcons improved to 2-2 overall and 1-0 in the Mountain East Conference.

Concord slipped to 2-2 overall and 0-1 in the MEC.

The Mountain Lions raced to a 49-40 lead at halftime, primarily on the strength of 11 of 19 shooting from 3-point range. Senior guard B.J. Hamlet did a lot of damage in the first half, scoring 18 points while making seven of 11 field goals.

Although the Falcons made only two of 11 attempted 3-pointers in the first half, it wasn’t offense that was on NDC coach Tim Koenig’s mind when he addressed his players in the locker room at halftime.

“Of the seven minutes I spoke, about 61/2 of them were focused on defense,” Koenig said.

Whatever words Koenig used, they fell on receptive ears.

After scorching the nets in the first half, the Mountain Lions had to claw for the eight baskets and 27 points they managed in the second half. Koenig credited senior guard Kyauta Taylor with accepting the challenge of slowing down Hamlet, who scored 10 points in the second half on 3-of-9 shooting.

Taylor also had 11 points and seven rebounds. Freshman guard Halil Parks scored 11 points off the bench. Voorhees added 10 rebounds, four assists, three blocked shots and two steals.

“Of the seven minutes I spoke, about 61⁄2 of them were focused on defense.” Notre Dame College coach Tim Koenig