BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) — Sean Pedulla scored a career-high 20 points, Justyn Mutts had 16 points, 11 rebounds and five assists and Virginia Tech beat Lehigh 78-52 on Thursday night.
Virginia Tech scored the opening nine points of the game, all by Mutts and Grant Basile, as Lehigh missed its first five shots. Pedulla made Virginia Tech’s third 3-pointer of the first half to extend the lead to 43-25. Pedulla had a game-high 16 points in the half and Mutts added 12.
The Hokies closed the game on a 12-4 run for its largest lead of 26.
Basile added 11 points and eight rebounds for Virginia Tech (2-0). Mutts, who was unavailable in the opener because of an NCAA-mandated one-game suspension, was 6 of 8 from the field but just 3 of 7 at the stripe.
Basile, a 6-foot-9 transfer from Wright State, had 30 points and 10 rebounds in Virginia Tech’s opening 95-57 win over Delaware State. He averaged 18.4 points and 8.5 rebounds last season as Wright State won the Horizon League championship.
Jakob Alamudun scored 14 points for Lehigh (0-2), which was coming off a loss to Syracuse. Dominic Parolin added 10 points.
___
More AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball and https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25