Stopped the bleeding

ETSU snapped a three-game skid Monday night as the Bucs rolled over James Madison behind a season-high 23-point performance from Isiah Brown inside the ETSU/MSHA Athletic Center.

JMU struggled to keep Brown out of the low-post. Brown went 10-for-14 from the field and snatched nine boards in only 20 minutes of play, after the Miami native fell into foul trouble early on.

ETSU used this to their advantage and continued to control the paint throughout the game for a 70-56 victory.

 "[I've] been rolling, shooting a pretty good field goal percentage as of lately," Brown said. "[I] got a lot of touches tonight and capitalized … very efficient."

The 6'8" center also threw down a couple of monster dunks during the night, including a two-handed slam off an assist from Tommy Hubbard that put the Bucs up 65-53 with a 1:30 left in regulation and sealed the victory for good.

"[James Madison] didn't have that dominant post defender, so obviously we wanted to get him [Isiah Brown] more touches," head coach Murry Bartow said.

"We thought they would double him a little more, but a lot of it was one-one-one. When he's one-on-one, he's pretty good."

This season Brown is shooting a higher percentage from the field, at 56 percent, than he is from the free-throw line, which currently sits at 52 percent.

Adam Sollazzo also helped set the pace early for the Buccaneers, scoring the opening points with a deep 3-pointer and followed it with a fast-break dunk after a Sheldon Cooley steal.

"Hitting that first big three definitely helped my confidence out. I haven't been playing like the player I think I am," Sollazzo said. "Just seeing the ball go in really helped me out a lot."

Sollazzo, who has struggled shooting in recent games, finished this one with 19 points off a strong 7-for-10 shooting effort and brought down five rebounds.

Cooley scored nine points and tallied six of ETSU's 18 steals, which bumped the Buccaneers to No. 1 in the country with 10.62 steals per game, according to ESPN.com.

Humpty Hitchens led the Duke Dogs with 20 points and shot 6-for-10 from behind the 3-point line, while teammate A.J. Davis shot 4-for-6 from the field for a total of 11 points.

ETSU dominated JMU inside — scoring 42 points in the paint, outrebounding the Duke Dogs 30-25 and scoring 19 second chance points in the first matchup between these teams in over a decade.

They will kick off another Atlantic Sun Conference bout as they visit Kennesaw State Saturday at 3 p.m.

ETSU is currently sitting in sixth place in the A-Sun conference standings with five wins and five losses.