By Ron Smith
February 27, 2021
 
(SANTA BARBARA, Calif.) Westmont Men's Basketball (7-4, 4-2) cruised to a 114-74 victory over Hope International on Saturday to conclude a three-game sweep of the Royals and Golden State Athletic Conference regular season play. The Warriors average 119.7 points in the series with the Royals.
 
With the win, Westmont pulled into a first-place tie with Vanguard in the Golden State Athletic Conference standings, resulting in a Co-GSAC West Regular Season Championship. Vanguard, which holds the tiebreaker courtesy of a 2-1 head-to-head record, gets the automatic berth into the NAIA National Championships.
 
Postseason aspirations for the Warriors rest on receiving an at-large invitation to the NAIA National Championship. The tournament brackets will be announced in the late afternoon on Thursday.
 
Ajay Singh tallied 23 points and 18 rebounds to lead the Warriors in both categories. He also notched six blocks, which ties for second in Westmont history. Evan Haines set the record for most blocks in a game at eight in January of 2010.
 
"Ajay took advantage of being taller than the opposing team," said Westmont head coach Landon Boucher. "He was patient offensively and the team found him good looks. He protected the paint with his blocks. The rebounding has been an issue all year. To come up with 18 rebounds was a big part of the game."
 
Cade Roth produced 21 points, eight assists, four rebounds and two blocks while Jared Brown tallied 20 points, five rebounds and seven assists.
 
"Cade got us off to a good start by scoring 18 in the first half," noted Boucher. "Jared was steady. Along with his 20 points he had seven assist. He has done great taking over as point guard. Since he took over, we are getting a lot of points and are hard to stop."
 
Tyler Austin notched a double-double for the second straight game with 15 points and 12 rebounds. He also had five assists. Hunter Sipe just missed a double-double with 14 points and nine rebounds.  
 
In Westmont's 11 games this season, the Warriors have scored triple figures in five. As a result, this year's team has recorded the highest scoring average in Westmont history at 96.9 points per game and has four of the top-ten highest scoring games in the Warrior record book.
 
The Warriors also set a new Westmont record in free throw percentage at 77.7 (160 of 206). This year's squad ranks sixth among Warrior teams in field goal accuracy at 54.5% (391 of 717) and third in 3-point percentage at 42.5 (124 of 292).
 
In the NAIA, Westmont currently ranks fourth in points per game, second in field goal percentage, third in 3-point field goal percentage, fifth in 3-point field goals made per game (11.27) and second in assist-to-turnover ratio (1.59).
 
Within the conference, Westmont leads the GSAC in scoring, field goal percentage, 3-point field goal percentage, free throw percentage, assists per game (19.3) and assist-to-turnover ratio.
 
The Warriors are hoping that the NAIA selection committee will take note of their strong statistical resume and award the team an at-large berth.
 
"We are playing the best basketball of the year right now," said Boucher. "It is a shame that, because of COVID, we have only been able to play six conference games this year while the other pod has played more games. It would be great to continue playing and see what we could do in the postseason."