MARION, Ind. -- A packed Luckey Arena witnessed a second straight outright Mid-Central College Conference regular season championship Saturday afternoon as the No. 9-ranked Indiana Wesleyan University men's basketball team stopped a red-hot Grace (Ind.) College team 77-65.

The winner of the game would lay claim to the No. 1-seed in the upcoming MCC Tournament. Indiana Wesleyan had already clinched a share of the title, but the victory secured the outright title. Grace was playing to share the conference championship with Indiana Wesleyan.

The two teams converged to the biggest game of the season in two different ways. Indiana Wesleyan, after a program record 19-game win streak, had dropped three of their last four games. Meanwhile, Grace was riding a five game win streak and was winners in 11 of their last 13 games.

Indiana Wesleyan (24-6, 13-3 MCC) would claim the programs' third straight MCC crown and fourth in five years with an excellent defensive effort in a game that Indiana Wesleyan led for nearly the entire afternoon.

Grace (21-9, 11-5 MCC) trailed by less than five points for the first 11 minutes of the game until freshman forward Greg Miller hit a 3-pointer for the first Grace lead of the day at 20-19 with 9:05 in the first half. But 15 seconds later sophomore forward Aaron Martin regained the lead for Indiana Wesleyan with two free throws.

After neither team scored for two and a half minutes, Grace sophomore guard Elliot Smith drilled a 3-pointer for the second Lancer lead. Again the lead quickly vanished as IWU sophomore forward Patrick Hopkins scored in the paint 16 seconds later to tie the score at 23-23.

Grace would capture the lead right back with another 3-point bucket by Smith, but freshman guard Jordan Weidner and Hopkins scored on the next two Indiana Wesleyan possessions for a 27-26 lead. Grace regained the lead one final time on their next possession with a field goal by freshman center Dennis Williams, but on the next IWU possession junior guard David Peters connected on a pair of free throws to tie the score 28-28 with 2:54 remaining before half. Grace would not lead again.

Indiana Wesleyan would lead by as many as six before halftime and took a 35-32 lead into the break.

The Wildcats never trailed in the second half, but Grace was able to tie the score at 35-35 in the opening minute of the stanza. The Wildcats then scored 12 of the next 14 points to open up their largest lead so far at 47-37.

IWU increased the lead to 12 points at 51-39 before Grace made a run. The Lancers limited the Wildcats to just two points over the next five minutes to run off a 10-2 spurt and close the gap to four points at 53-49.

Senior center Sebastian Weber was wide open under the basket for an easy layup to end the Grace threat and ignite an 8-0 run for Indiana Wesleyan. IWU scored eight points in just two minutes and led 61-49 with six minutes remaining.

Grace could only close to within nine points on three occasions the rest of the way out as Indiana Wesleyan lengthened the lead to as many as 17 points (75-58) in the closing five minutes.

The Wildcat defense was stellar on Saturday. They held a Lancer offense which averaged 78 points per game and shot 48.0-percent from the field to 65 points and 38.1-percent (24 of 63) shooting.

Offensively, Indiana Wesleyan shot 42.6-percent (26 of 61) from the floor but collected 12 offensive rebounds and committed only eight turnovers. IWU also got to the line a lot and hit 22-of-30 from the line (73.3-percent) while Grace was just 10-of-13 (76.9-percent).

Hopkins and Weidner led all players with 19 points apiece. Hopkins finished with a double-double as he grabbed 10 rebounds and Weidner added a game-high five assists. Sophomore guard Aaron Martin contributed 17 points and six rebounds while senior forward Will Hubertz ended with eight points and seven rebounds.

Indiana Wesleyan is the MCC Tournament's No. 1-seed which begins on Wednesday, February 23. IWU will play host to No. 8-seed Bethel (Ind.) College at 7 p.m. in Luckey Arena.

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