GREENSBORO, N.C. – Chaos ball reigned supreme on Wednesday evening on Jack Jensen Court in the Ragan-Brown FieldHouse, as behind a double-double showing from Rival Axselle (Mechanicsville, Va.) and a season-best showing on the defensive end, the Guilford College men's basketball team (9-7, 3-4 ODAC) secured their third straight Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC) win, 76-57 over Averett University in the battle of Route-29.

It was a sloppy outing on both sides, with the Cougars committing a season-high 31 turnovers while the Quakers also approached their season-high with 18 of their own, though the hosts did well capitalizing on the mistakes better, with a 36-12 advantage in points off turnovers. But in a season defined by the Guilford offense, it instead was their defense that owned the night, holding AU to season-lows on the scoreboards and in shooting percentage, at .297 including .222 from three. GC did not exactly shoot the lights out in contrast, but their 15 extra shot attempts and higher rates of .354 overall and .364 from three were good enough to earn the win.

Axselle checked in with his second double-double of the season on the night, leading the Quakers in rebounding, with 10, alongside 13 points and a pair of steals. For the fourth-straight game, Braylen Salters (Cleveland, Ohio) paced Guilford in the scoring column, netting 16 tallies although he needed 19 shots from the field to get there on this night. Gabe Proctor (Apex, N.C.) netted a quartet of threes and nabbed four steals on a 14-point evening while Ke Edwards (Hickory, N.C.) checked in with his second-straight double-digit scoring output, finishing with 10 points on 4-5 shooting on top of three steals off the bench. Tripp McMillen (Dobson, N.C.) added six points and six boards in reserve while Reynolds Escher (Atlanta, Ga.) added seven points and was Guilford's top distributor, with four assists.

Averett got scoring contributions from nine of the ten players who appeared on the night, but unfortunately, only one of them reached double-digits as Timayahs Bracey netted 11 points on 4-14. Jackson Sellars led all players with 13 rebounds, followed closely by Tyler Stephens with a dozen, but the Quakers held the duo to just seven and eight points respectively. Jalen Chambers netted nine points and Josh Seiler passed out a team-high four assists off the bench for the Cougars.

This one was sloppy early, with more offensive fouls, two, than defensive fouls, one, and as many shot clock violations, three, as made field goals over the first four minutes of action. The offenses never fully settled in to consistent, high-level execution on the night, but they stabilized some in the ensuing moments, throughout which the Quakers maintained a one to two possession margin, with their lead peaking at seven following Proctor gathering an offensive rebound, retreating to the corner and connecting on a corner three, bringing the score to 11-4. Averett worked back, scoring seven of the next nine as the opening half of a 14-5 uprising, to claim their first, and ultimately only lead, 18-16. However, as swiftly as AU had claimed control, GC, in turn, made it a runaway. Ke Edwards hit a floater in the lane then a second-chance turnaround jumper before Salters got in on the fun with a third-chance hoop, McMillen connected on a transition trey then an emphatic two-handed jam on the break, another two from Salters, and finally a second-chance three from Escher. All-told, the Quakers scored 16-unanswered, matching their longest scoring run of the season thus far, and seizing control that they would never relinquish. The Cougars netted seven-straight into the locker rooms, bringing the score to 32-25 at the half.

Averett continued to hang around, hovering between seven and 11 points over then first few minutes until a Seiler third-chance basket trimmed the margin to five. That is as close as it would get though, as just like the first half, Guilford took a pivotal moment and turned it into a lengthy run. This time, Enzo Geremski (Winston-Salem, N.C.) lit the spark with a three, Dawson Edwards (Durham, N.C.) finished a tip-in two, Ke Edwards scored two more, Salters got a pair at the stripe and Axselle converted a fast-break lay-in to open a 49-33 lead again. AU got their deficit down to nine on a couple of occasions, but never truly threatened thanks to another 11-2 GC response and the Cougars had run out of runs to get back in it as the score finished 76-57.

Guilford's next game got moved up a day due to weekend weather, as they will now play host to Shenandoah University in the Ragan-Brown FieldHouse on Friday evening, tipping off at 4:00 PM.

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