Navy's highly touted basketball team, which had gotten off to a sluggish 1-2 start, got on track last night against Division III Gettysburg.
Navy was too big, too strong and too good for the visitors, who came into the game with a 5-0 record. The Mids were runaway 102-65 winners.
Alex Kohnen, the powerful 6-foot-11 Navy junior center from St. Louis, scored a career-high 25 points. He also had 10 rebounds. Kohnen and the rest of the regulars watched the last 10 minutes from the bench.
"This was a confidence builder," Kohnen said. "We needed a game like this where we could get a lot of guys going. Our team's greatest strength is depth. We can cycle nine guys and everybody's still ready to go."
Wes Cooper had 19 points for the winners and grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds. Plebe Michael Heary hit five of nine three-point tries and finished with 17 points.
"Wes Cooper has improved more than anybody on our team," said Navy coach Don DeVoe. "And Michael Heary showed that he can shoot the ball.
"That's what I liked about our play in this game. Last week, we struggled to score 53 points against Brown. Tonight we really got our offense going."
Junior Anthony Toner was the outstanding player for Gettysburg. The 5-11 guard scored 21 points and turned in a strong overall performance.
Gettysburg's only lead was at 5-4 with the game 2:30 old. Damian Halligan made two free throws to put the Bullets ahead.
Heary came off the bench and hit a pair of threes to put the Mids ahead by 35-17. With 2:10 left in the half, Larry Green took a no-look pass from Greg Stephens and stuffed the shot for a 48-23 lead that brought the Alumni Hall crowd of 791 to its feet.
It was the first time Navy had scored 100 in 106 games, the first time ever at Alumni Hall.