CARLISLE, Pa.—No. 1 Swarthmore College Men's Basketball picked up its 15th straight win on Saturday, managing the Dickinson College Red Devils 81-62.
Swarthmore improved to 8-0 in Centennial play while the host Red Devils dipped to 1-14 overall and 1-7 in conference.
Zac O'Dell posted his fifth double-double of the season to lead the Garnet. The senior dropped in 17 points and grabbed 10 rebounds in the winning effort.
George Visconti added 16 points and six rebounds. Conor Harkins sank four 3-pointers en route to a 13-point game. Colin Shaw Shaw hit 5-of-10 shots and finished with 12 points off the bench.
Nate Shafer added eight points, with six of them coming from the free-throw line. Shafer's success rate from the free-throw line has improved from 59.8 percent in 2018-19 to 75.6 percent this season. The Garnet scored 20 points from the free-throw line for the third time this season as the team went 20-for-29.
Swarthmore corralled exactly twice as many rebounds as Dickinson 46-23.
Dickinson started off on the right foot, throwing down a dunk following the opening tip. The Red Devils led by five points eight minutes into the contest, but a four-point play by Harkins started the shift in Swarthmore's favor. And just like the Garnet have done all season, they went on one of their runs that devastates their opponents. The four-point play triggered a 19-2 run by Swarthmore capped off with a Shaw triple at 5:25 in the first.
Another Shaw 3-point dagger with 40 seconds left in the half put Swarthmore ahead by 20.
Dickinson kept pace with the Garnet in the second half, but couldn't recover from that first-half barrage. Swarthmore's lead remained in the double digits for all but nine seconds of the second half.
Swarthmore now preps for its second meeting of the year with Ursinus College on Wednesday at 8 p.m. Swarthmore escaped Ursinus with an 88-86 win in December.