North Dakota State Bison at Xavier Musketeers

No. 7 Xavier rolls to 85-55 win over North Dakota State

Bluiett scored 15 of his 23 points during Xavier's dominant first half, and the seventh-ranked Musketeers remained unbeaten with an 85-55 victory over North Dakota State on Tuesday night.

The Musketeers (7-0) opened with a decisive run for the second straight game. Bluiett hit the biggest shots and finished with seven assists and five rebounds. He dropped his weight from 217 to 194 pounds in the offseason to improve his quickness.

"I'm trying not to rely on the 3-ball too much," said Bluiett, who went 3 of 8 from beyond the arc. "Live by the 3, die by the 3, and I tried to change that philosophy. Losing weight kind of helped that, too. I've been able to incorporate things into my game."

Sean O'Mara added 12 points and five rebounds, and Malcolm Bernard had 10 points and eight rebounds.

The Musketeers finished with 23 assists on 31 field goals.

"I thought the offense flowed well, we shared the ball a lot," Bernard said. "I love the way we played on offense. I thought it was fun, it was exciting."

Redshirt freshman Deng Geu scored a career-high 18 for the Bison, who trailed by as many as 36 points. Nobody else scored more than nine.

"Deng is only eight games into his varsity career," coach David Richman said. "He has oodles and oodles of potential, but he's struggled with his confidence. It was good for him to hit that first 3. I thought he played better after that."

POLL IMPLICATIONS

Xavier moved up two spots in this week's poll to No. 7, where it started the season. The Musketeers have a chance to make their case for another jump with a game at No. 9 Baylor on Saturday.

BIG PICTURE

North Dakota State: The Bison are 3-11 against ranked teams, with the wins over No. 13 Wisconsin in 2005-06, No. 9 Marquette in 2006-07, and No. 20 Oklahoma during the 2014 NCAA tournament.

Xavier: Sophomore forward Kaiser Gates moved much better in his second game back from surgery to repair torn cartilage in his left knee. He scored six points and had two rebounds in 14 minutes. Against Northern Iowa, Gates played 11 minutes, missed his only shot and picked up three fouls.

"His (conditioning) is probably the thing that's going to keep him back from playing more right now, it's not his knee," coach Chris Mack said . "We just feel like he's building toward being a full-time contributor. He took a better step tonight, a lot better step than against Northern Iowa."

FAST STARTS

Xavier won its first 12 games last year and its first eight games in 2011, the Musketeers' best starts during Mack's eight seasons.

QUIET SUMNER

Xavier point guard Edmond Sumner played only 12 minutes in the first half and didn't take a shot. He finished with five points and seven assists in 23 minutes, by far his season low.

NO 3s ... OR ANYTHING ELSE

North Dakota State's A.J. Jacobson was 14 of 18 on 3-points shots heading into the game, so Xavier locked in on him. Jacobson missed both of his shots and failed to score.

UP NEXT

North Dakota State plays at North Carolina A&T on Friday, ending a three-game road swing.

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More AP college basketball: http://collegebasketball.ap.org

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