CLAYTON, Mo. - Webster University Men's Basketball pushed its win streak to five straight victories in St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference play here Thursday evening as the Gorloks collected a hard-fought 77-69 win in the Battle of Big Bend over Fontbonne University at the Dunham Student Activities Center.

With the win, Webster improves its record to 12-8 overall and 11-2 in the SLIAC, while Fontbonne falls to 10-10 overall and 8-5 in the league. The win also helped the Gorloks remain in first place by two games over Greenville, who is 9-4 in the league, while Fontbonne and Blackburn are tied for third in the league with 8-5 records with five games remaining in the regular season.

Wednesday's game was also the second this season against the Griffins as the Gorloks have now won nine straight games in the series against Fontbonne and have swept the season series the past four years.

In Thursday's game, which was pushed back one day following a winter storm that hit the St. Louis area on Wednesday, Webster shot 50 percent from the field, including shooting 55 percent from the field in the second half as the Gorloks outscored the Griffins, 44-39, to win its fifth straight game and also win for the ninth time in 10 games in 2020. 

Whille shooting 50 percent from the field, the Gorloks struggled from long distance on Thursday as one game after making a season high 14 treys and shooting a Division III season best 83.4 percent from the 3-point line in last Saturday's 126-78 win at MacMurray, the Gorloks were just 3-for-14 (21 percent) from the 3-point line.

Junior Rodson Etienne (West Palm Beach, Fla./Royal Palm Beach) paced Webster's offensive attack on Thursday as he scored a game high 23 points, including tallying 17 of those points after halftime, including scoring 15 of Webster's first 22 second half points. 

In addition to Etienne, senior guard Josh Johnson (St. Louis, Mo./Clayton) added 15 points and a career high nine rebounds, while senior forward Enrique Tankins (Wentzville, Mo./Timberland) had 13 points in the win. With his 15 points, Johnson pushed his career scoring total to 1,100 points and is now just 15 points shy of 11th place on the school's all-time scoring chart, which is held by Brady Barke, who scored 1,115 points as a Gorlok from 2000-04. 

Freshman guard Jordan Clay (St. Louis, Mo./Blackburn College) and freshman guard Wynne Brown, Jr. (Memphis, Tenn./Bartlett) each had nine points, while Clay added eight rebounds, five assists and four steals.

Perhaps the shot of the night in Thursday's game came from Johnson as he closed the first half by drilling a shot from just behind half court that went through the basket right as the buzzer sounded. Johnson's half court shot right before the buzzer helped give the Gorloks a 33-30 lead the half. 

Johnson's shot seemed to give the Gorloks some momentum in the game as Webster opened the second half by scoring five of the first seven points to push its three point halftime lead to 38-32 just 95 seconds into the second half. 

The Griffins, though, would respond with an 11-3 run capped by a trey from Anthony Jones at the 14:41 mark to give FBU a 43-41 lead. The two teams would then trade the lead for the next two-plus minutes until Webster used a 10-2 run that began with a fast break dunk from senior guard Blake Ferrell (Ballwin, Mo./Parkway South) and was capped by a lay-up from Etienne. Etienne's lay-up gave Webster a 55-47 lead with 9:28 left in the game.

After the Griffins scored six of the next eight points to cut WU's lead to 57-53 with eight minutes left, the Gorloks would respond with a 12-6 run to push its lead to 69-59 with 3:15 remaining. The 10 point lead was the largest of the game for the Gorloks. FBU would score 10 of the final 18 points to set the final margin. including getting as close as six points at 73-67 following two free throws from Elijah Rice with 1:06 left. 

Jones led Fontbonne with 14 points, while Noah Coddington added 13 points and eight rebounds and Rice tallied 10 points and five boards in the loss. 

Fontbonne scored the first four points of the game and led by as much as six points just nine minutes into the contest, before Webster eight of the next 10 points to tie the game at 17. Back-to-back treys from Coddington and Cody McKinney gave FBU a 23-17 lead, but the Gorloks responded with an 11-0 run capped by four straight points from senior guard Aron Hopp (Lincoln, Ill./Lincoln College) to take a 28-23 lead with 2:27 left in the opening half. 

The Griffins would come right back and score seven of next nine points to tie the game at 30, before Johnson's tie-breaking half court shot to close the opening half. 

Webster finished the game with a 31-28 edge on the glass and forced Fontbonne into 18 turnovers that led to 18 points for the Gorloks. The Gorloks committed 15 turnovers and held a 26-7 edge in fast break points. 

FBU finished the game shooting 42 percent from the field and 43 percent from the 3-point line. 

Both teams combined to shoot 41 free throws on the night as Webster was 14-for-19 (74 percent) from the line, including Johnson going 5-for-5 from the line and has now made nine consecutive free throws. FBU was 15-for-22 (68 percent) from the line. 

Webster will look to make it six consecutive wins this coming Saturday, Feb. 8 as the Gorloks host Principia College (3-16 overall, 2-11 SLIAC) for a 3 p.m. game at Grant Gymnasium. Webster picked up a 94-78 win at Principia on Jan. 7 in the first meeting this season between the two teams.