Cleveland State head coach Gary Waters made sure his team was "prepared" to face UW-Green Bay Friday and not overlooking them for a potential first-place match-up with UW-Milwaukee on Sunday.

The Vikings took care of its business Friday night by easily defeating the Phoenix 78-68 at the Wolstein Center, but it was Milwaukee that fell victim of the trap game, losing at Youngstown State.

"We knew we had to play (Green Bay) because on film they have played at times better then Milwaukee," said Waters. "You have to take care of your home court. If you don't do that, the road games don't mean anything."

The win improves CSU to 16-4 and 6-2 in the Horizon League and moves the Vikings into a first place tie with Milwaukee and Valparaiso.

"We knew this was a set-up game," said Trey Harmon, who led the Vikings with 19 points, and was 4-for-6 on three-pointers. "You can't look past any team in this league. That's what is scary about this league, on any given night any team could win."

The Vikings also had double-digit scoring from Tim Kamczyc (12 points), Jeremy Montgomery (11), and freshmen Anton Grady had his first career double-double with 10 points and 13 rebounds.

Green Bay (7-11, 3-5 Horizon League) were led by Keifer Sykes and Kam Cerroni with 15 points each.

CSU took care of business early using its three-point shooting to take the lead. The Vikings made five of their six three-pointers in the first half.

Trailing, 8-4, Montgomery's three-pointer cut the lead to 8-7, then Harmon's first three-pointer tied the game at 10-10.

Harmon's second three-pointer gave the Vikings its first lead, 13-12, and proved to be the go-ahead basket. His third three-pointer extended the lead to double-digits (26-16) with 6:44 left.

A tip-in by Green Bay's Alec Brown at the buzzer cut the lead to 36-30 at the half.

The Vikings ended any chance of a upset by starting the second half on a 13-4 run to take a 49-34 lead as Aaron Pogue found Kamczyc for a lay-up with 16:29 left.

"I told the team at halftime that we weren't locking into them defensively and we were committing too many fouls," said Waters, whose team committed 23 fouls that led to 30 free throw attempts for Green Bay. "We need to stop fouling because that lets teams hang with us. We work hard on defense and then we commit petty fouls that are unnecessary."

CSU built the lead to as much as 18 in the second half and never let the lead get below six points.

The Vikings shot 50.9 percent from the field and held advantages in rebounding (43-23), points in the paint (40-24), fast break points (14-2) and bench scoring (19-9).

"I told the guys in the locker room how proud I was of the effort on the glass," said Waters.

Anton Grady photo courtesy of Cleveland State athletics

Coming off impressive home wins last week against Illinois-Chicago and Loyola of Chicago, the Cleveland State Vikings hit the road again for the Indiana trip—arguably the toughest road trip of the season.

The Vikings (14-3, 4-1 Horizon League) face its rival Butler (9-8, 3-2 HL) tonight in a national televised game on ESPNU (7 p.m.) and Valparaiso (10-7, 3-2 HL) Sunday (2:35 p.m.).

"No one over the last five or six years have won both of those games," said CSU head coach Gary Waters. "If you can (sweep this road trip) it changes the dynamics of the league."

UW-Milwaukee, who leads the Horizon at 5-1, split the Indiana trip—losing to Butler and defeating Valpo. The Panthers are a half-game ahead of CSU and Youngstown State, who are both 4-1 in the conference.

CSU has been one of the best road teams this season as they are 7-1 in road games. The seven road wins are tied for most in the nation.

"I don't think these kids fear the road," said Waters. "They just go out and play."

The Vikings will try to end the stigma that they can't beat Butler.

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The Cleveland State men's basketball team put together their second straight dominating performance as the Vikings easily handled Loyola of Chicago, 69-48, Saturday afternoon at the Wolstein Center.

CSU (14-3, 4-1 Horizon League) finished their three-game homestead at 2-1.

After losing their Horizon home opener to Youngstown State last week, the Vikings rebounded with impressive wins against Illinois-Chicago (Thursday) and Loyola.

Senior guard Trey Harmon returned to the lineup for the Vikings after missing Thursday's UIC game with a concussion and immediately returned to form. The Pasadena, Calif. native hit a career-high six three-pointers and scored a game-high 20 points.

"The first couple of minutes I had to catch my wind, but I felt good," said Harmon. "I had a lot of time to rest and recover."

CSU head coach Gary Waters said that Harmon is now using a special mouthpiece that absorbs some of the pain if he gets hit in the head again.

Two minutes into the game, Harmon hit his first three-pointer to give CSU an early 3-1 lead. His second three-pointer gave the Vikings the lead for good (13-11) with just over eight minutes left in the half.

"I let the game come to me," said Harmon, who hit his first five three-pointers and finished 6-for-7 from downtown. "I took the shots that were open and the hard work that I've been putting in the gym is finally coming around."

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Cleveland State enters Horizon League play on Saturday at 12-2 overall, including 2-0 in league play after sweeping the first set of Horizon League games in early December.

The Vikings picked up solid wins in the non-conference portion of the schedule including a top-50 RPI win at Vanderbilt and top-100 wins at Kent State and at Robert Morris and home vs. St. Bonaventure. The Vikings also knocked off MAC contender Akron and rounded out the non-conference slate on Wednesday with a win at Toledo to improve to 3-0 against the MAC this season.

On the other hand, the two losses were not-so-good as they came to 6-7 Hofstra in a neutral site game and on the road to 7-7 South Florida.

With the focus now fully on the Horizon League (save the annual ESPN Bracketbuster game in February), the Vikings are in good shape to make a run towards a conference championship thanks to their tough defense and their 2-0 head start on the rest of the league (only Milwaukee remains unbeaten in conference play).

Even with a stingy defense that has propelled CSU to its fast start, the Vikings will need improvement on offense and the continued development of its talented freshman class in order to go dancing in March.

Here are my keys for a Horizon League Championship:

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