Jalun Trent scored a career-high 27 points and Jyare Davis added 19 as visiting Delaware extended Xavier’s home losing streak to three games with an 87-80 victory Tuesday in Cincinnati.
Cavan Reilly added 17 points on 5-of-7 shooting from 3-point range for the Blue Hens (6-3), who ended a three-game losing streak while improving to 3-1 in true road games.
Delaware trailed by 10 points in the first half and grabbed its first 10-point lead with just under eight minutes remaining in the game.
Quincy Olivari scored 34 points, 17 in each half, for Xavier (4-5), while Desmond Claude added 14 as the Musketeers fell to 3-3 at home. Dayvion McKnight scored 12 points for Xavier, which has dropped five of its last seven games, including defeats to then-No. 2 Purdue and then-No. 6 Houston.
Delaware built its first 10-point lead at 74-64 with 7:58 remaining on a 3-pointer by Reilly 3-pointer and continued to lead by double digits at 76-66 with 6:33 left.
Xavier pulled within 77-71 with 4:53 remaining on a jumper by Claude, but a 6-1 scoring burst from Delaware increased the lead to 83-72 with 3:32 remaining, and the Blue Hens cruised to the victory.
In a first half of runs, Delaware went on a 16-2 scoring burst to take a 32-28 lead with 6:59 left rallying from 10 points behind. Xavier answered with an 11-2 run late in the half and went into the break with a 41-38 lead, powered by Olivari.
Delaware opened the second half on an 8-2 run to take a 46-43 lead and an extended 12-4 run to grab its biggest lead of the game to that point, 50-45, with 16:37 remaining.
Xavier rallied to take a 58-56 lead with 13:11 remaining on two free throws from Dailyn Swain. But a 9-0 run from Delaware put the Blue Hens up 67-58 with 10:17 left.
–Field Level Media