Vince Iwuchukwu scored a career-high 28 points and had 13 rebounds as Georgetown survived a real scare before holding on for an 83-78 win over Delaware State on Tuesday night in Washington.
Iwuchukwu converted a 3-point play after grabbing the offensive rebound with 23 seconds left to give Georgetown an 81-76 lead. It was Iwuchukwu’s seventh career double-double.
Jaland Lowe, a day after being named Big East Player of the Week, scored 10 points and tallied a career-best 15 assists. Kayvaun Mulready had 14 points while Josiah Parker added 13 and Caleb Williams scored 10.
Georgetown (3-0) used a late 7-0 run to take a 75-69 lead after a Lowe layup with 3:59 remaining. Nasir Muhammad sank a 3-pointer with 1:33 left to bring Delaware State back to within 77-74.
Anthony Parker drained a contested jumper to cut the Hornets’ deficit to 78-76 before Iwuchukwu put the game away. Iwuchukwu was 10 for 11 from the free-throw line as the Hoyas outscored Delaware State 21-11 from the charity stripe.
Nehemiah Reedus led Delaware State (1-2) with 19 points while Anthony Parker had 16 and Joshua Obiora scored 15.
What looked like a mismatch on paper turned into a back-and-forth affair with 14 lead changes and eight ties.
Delaware State entered the game ranked 364 out of 365 in KenPom Rankings and was a 30.5-point underdog against a Georgetown team that was coming off a dominating performance in an 86-74 win over local rival and Big Ten foe Maryland on Saturday.
After trailing by 12 moments into the second half, the Hoyas slowly chipped away at the deficit before taking their first lead of the half at 52-50 on Josiah Parker’s 3-pointer with 12:05 remaining. Georgetown made 8 of 23 3-point attempts (34.8%) but hit 5 of 11 in the second half.
Delaware State held a surprising 43-33 lead at the half behind 17 points from Reedus. The Hornets fell behind 5-0 but took an 11-9 lead on the second of back-to-back buckets by Muazibini Adamu with 14:55 left in the half.
Neither team led by more than five until Delaware State ended the half on an 18-4 run that included three of Reedus’ four first half 3-pointers. The Hornets shot 59.3% in the first half while limiting Georgetown to 40.7% shooting.