After Wagner and Central Connecticut State split the regular season series, it was fitting the two schools would meet in the first round of their conference tournament.
The rubber match between the Seahawks and the Blue Devils would be the one that decided who would advance and who would go home in the Northeast Conference tournament and it was Wagner that emerged triumphant, eliminating Central Connecticut State with a dominant 72-50 win at the Spiro Sports Center Wednesday night.
“It’s the playoffs, it’s what you expect,” Wagner junior guard Kenny Ortiz said. “It’s the last game, go hard or go home. I’m pretty sure every team is thinking like that, you can’t take any plays off because you’re not promised tomorrow.”
Wagner cruised to the double-digit victory thanks to stellar offensive performances from junior forward Jonathon Williams and sophomore guard Marcus Burton. The pair combined to score 35 points for the Seahawks (19-11, 12-6).
“Marcus had hit one right before so I just kept going to the guy who was hot and I knew he was going to hit it,” Ortiz said.
Despite the blowout on the scoreboard, the game was very physical and on four occasions did Wagner and Central Connecticut State (13-17, 9-10) players need to be separated and warned by officials.
The third near-altercation of the game came as Williams chased down Blue Devils forward Terrell Allen and blocked him on a last-second layup attempt at the end of the first half. Both players would wind up crashing to the ground and were pulled apart before heading into the locker room.
“I like [the physical play],” Williams said. “I’d rather play it that way, more physical and our defense plays with more hands and bumping chests [down low].”
Continuing with the trend of physical play, the Seahawks dominated the glass, outrebounding the Blue Devils 56-40. Defensively, Ortiz, the NEC defensive player of the year, limited Central Connecticut leading scorer Kyle Vinales (23 points) to just 8-of-22 shooting.
“I thought we did a great job defensively and rebounding,” Wagner head coach Bashir Mason said. “I think we held them to 25 percent shooting and we outrebounded them [by 16]. That sort of summed up the game.”
After a loss on the road for Wagner in January, the third game between the two NEC schools was similar to the Seahawks’ 101-82 rout of the Blue Devils in Staten Island last month.
“The first time we played them…we had a string of injuries going,” Mason said. “It was a little bit of a bad stretch for us and we played them up at their place. I think we were conscious defensively against them the past two games defensively.”
Wagner will now host LIU-Brooklyn on Saturday in the semi-finals of the NEC tournament. The Seahawks won the first meeting of the season between the two NEC rivals, 94-92, last month.
“I’ve been confident the entire way,” Mason said. “I felt extremely confident and comfortable with our matchup tonight and we’ll figure out Saturday.”
asulla-heffinger@nypost.com