LEXINGTON, Va. — The Washington and Lee men's basketball team used a 22-0 run in the middle of the first half en route to a 71-53 victory over Shenandoah on Wednesday at the Warner Center.

With the game tied, 13-13, with 12:09 left in the first, junior forward Clayton Murtha (Dallas, Texas/Highland Park) ignited the spurt with back-to-back layups. He then assisted on a triple by sophomore forward Roy McMillan (Raleigh, N.C./Broughton), and sophomore guard Devin Kearns (Cibolo, Texas/Samuel Clemens) reeled off six straight points to push the lead to 26-13 at the 6:06 mark.

Murtha scored five more points on an old-fashioned three-point play and a layup, and then Kearns split a pair of free throws to extend to advantage to 32-13. Junior forward Nicholas George (Charleston, W.Va./Charleston Catholic) capped the run with a three-pointer (his fourth of the half) to give the Generals (5-7, 1-2 ODAC) a 22-point lead, 35-13, with 3:43 left in the period. The Hornets (5-7, 1-2 ODAC) answered by scoring 10 of the last 13 points of the half, as the Blue and White took a 38-23 advantage into the break.

Shenandoah whittled the gap down to seven points (45-38) in the opening six minutes of the second half, but the Generals responded with a 13-2 run over the next five minutes to extend the lead to 18 points, 58-40, with 9:09 left on the clock and effectively put the game away. During the spurt, Kearns and McMillan each had five points.

Murtha finished the game with a double-double, totaling 26 points and 10 rebounds on 11-of-16 from the floor. He has now scored at least 22 points in three straight contests. With his 26 points, Murtha moved to 20th on the W&L all-time scoring list with 1,047 career points.

Kearns registered a season-high 20 points, and George had 12 points and three assists. McMillan came off the bench to notch eight points, a season-high seven rebounds and a career-high six assists.

The Generals shot 40.9 percent (9-of-22) from beyond the arc, while holding the Hornets to 18.2 percent (4-of-22) from long range. W&L held a 37-31 edge in rebounds, and totaled 19 assists compared to 12 for Shenandoah.

The Hornets had three players each score 11 points. Senior guard Malcolm Clark and sophomore center Gabriel Gonzalez each had 11 with six rebounds, and junior guard Kaimonne Douglas also contributed 11 points.

The victory is the fourth straight for the Generals, which marks the longest for the team since the squad had two winning streaks of five games during the 2010-11 season.

W&L returns to action on Saturday, when it plays at Virginia Wesleyan at 4:30 pm.

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