Ithaca, NY - Coming off two straight NCAA appearances and looking ready for a third, Cornell wasn't a lower-end Division I team that the Clarkson University Men's Basketball team was taking on Monday evening. The Big Red held a dominant edge on the boards and took advantage of a tired Clarkson squad playing for the fourth time in eight days as Cornell beat the Golden Knights 82-37.

The Golden Knights fell to 6-4 overall and begin conference play this weekend when they host Vassar and Rensselaer. Cornell polished off its non-league schedule at 14-3, the most wins the Big Red have notched prior to their conference slate.

Though the Big Red started slowly on offense, its defense still helped the team pull away early, leading 18-7 by the 10-minute mark of the first half. An energetic Jon Jaques, who crashed the board for four early offensive boards, set the tone. When Clarkson's Brandon Linton (Queens, NY) hit  a 3-pointer off a broken play to make it 15-7, Jaques answered with a trey on the other end and the home team never saw the lead dip into single figures again. Peck's soaring dunk following a Geoff Reeves 3-pointer with 1:07 left in the half put the crowd of more than 2,400 on its feet and pushed the edge to 21 points (35-14), its biggest advantage in the half. Only an Elson Pickering (Brooklyn, NY) 3-pointer at the buzzer put a damper on a half where Cornell outrebounded the smaller Golden Knights 30-13.

The second half was more of the same, with Foote getting the ball repeatedly by rolling to the basket, getting a dunk to open the half (part of a 7-of-9 shooting day). A 30-6 Big Red run turned the game into a laugher by the time Asafo-Adjei found a streaking Figini in transition for a dunk with 7:39 left to make it 67-26. The reserves for both teams played out the clock as Cornell celebrated its 12th win in 13 games.

Cornell senior Ryan Wittman had 15 points and six rebounds, while classmate Jeff Foote chipped in with 14 points and eight rebounds and Louis Dale had 10 points, four assists, three steals and three rebounds to pace the Big Red. Cornell nearly had as many offensive rebounds (21) as Clarkson had total boards (22) and shot 49 percent overall while limiting the Golden Knights to 25 percent shooting.

Clarkson got eight points from both Elson Pickering and Felix Llanos (Queens, NY). Llanos added three assists and two rebounds, while Keith Murray (Queens, NY) had four rebounds and three steals.