BAYAMON, Puerto Rico – The Wheeling Jesuit men's basketball team started off its two-game trip to Puerto Rico with a 79-64 victory over Puerto Rico-Bayamon on Tuesday night. The Cardinal defense limited their opponent to a shooting percentage of 36 on the evening, while managing to shoot over 59 percent as a team.

WJU (8-1, 3-1 Mountain East Conference) was led by junior forward Kyle Ritz, who recorded his first double-double of the season which consisted of a team high 16 points and 13 rebounds. Ritz helped the Cardinals outrebound PR-Bayamon 41-29 in the contest.

"We started off a bit sluggish but were able to bounce back towards the end of the first half and carried that into the second half of play," head coach Danny Sancomb stressed. "We received great production inside from Kyle (Ritz). Our bench provided us with a huge boost - 30 points. I thought we did a good job defensively and we rebounded the ball well tonight."

The two teams exchanged baskets throughout the first period, as both teams held five point leads at least once. WJU took a lead late into the first 20 minutes of play when senior guard Justin Fritts netted a three pointer with just under five minutes remaining. Fellow senior Eric Siefert added a pair of free throws moments after to give WJU its three-point lead. Ritz made a layup with one minute remaining to give WJU a five-point lead at the break.

A pair of Fritts' three pointers within a one-minute span pushed the Cardinal lead to double digits, 47-36, with 13 minutes remaining in the second half.  Freshman Malik Grandy provided 20 quality minutes off the bench, including back-to-back baskets for WJU, stretching the lead to 13.

The largest Cardinal lead came when Grandy made a free throw attempt with 5:01 remaining. The WJU defense held on to the double-digit lead for the final five minutes, and went on to record its third consecutive victory.

Siefert provided the Cardinal offense with an impressive 15 points and nine rebounds. Fritts added 15 points of his own to go along with five assists and three steals. Haywood Highsmith finished the night with 12 points and six boards. Grandy finished with nine points, four rebounds, and three assists.