WICHITA - Chip Steven scored a career-high 19 points on his birthday to help move the Newman men's basketball team into sole possession of first place in the Heartland Conference with a 97-84 win over Arkansas-Fort Smith Saturday afternoon inside Newman's Fugate Gymnasium. Steven was one of five Jets to score more than 10 points in Newman's eighth consecutive home win.

Arkansas-Fort Smith (3-13) came out of the gates on fire, scoring five points on their first two possessions and forcing Newman (12-4) head coach Mark Potter to burn his first time out of the game just 59 seconds into the contest. The Jets responded with a 6-2 run to sneak within one, 7-6, by the 17:44 mark, but the blue-clad Lions responded with six unanswered points to take their largest lead of the game, 15-6, at the 14:50 mark. It was at that moment that Newman decided it had seen enough. The Jets went on a 13-4 run over the next four minutes thanks to six points from Will Burdette, and tied the game at 19-19 with 11:08 still to play in the opening half. Newman extended its run to 25-4, and had earned an eight-point, 31-23 edge by the 6:50 mark. A three-point basket from Fort Smith's Josh Simmons narrowed the Newman lead to five, 31-26, but Newman countered seven-straight points to push the lead back to 12, 38-26, at the 5:19 mark. Unphased, the Lions kept things interesting late in the half, forcing three Newman turnovers to kick-start a 13-5 run to end the half, when Newman's lead had been trimmed to four, 43-39.

Two free throws by Keaton Schultz to start the second half set the tempo for the junior's second half outing. After scoring just two points in the first half, Schultz found his groove, draining two three's in the fist two minutes of the second half, and helping the Jets push their lead back to 10, 54-44, at the 18:09 mark. Newman never trailed by less than four for the remainder of the contest, which turned into a free throw shoot-out down the stretch. After taking 16 free throw shots in the first half, the Jets shot 28 free throws in the second half for a total of 44 in the game. Newman converted 34 of them, including 10 from Justin Berry, to help seal the 97-84 win.

Chip Steven drained four treys and added seven free throws to finish with a career-high 19 points to lead the Jets in the contest. Jaray Mathews added four treys of his own on his way to an 18-point, 12-rebound double-double. Schultz also added 18 points in the game. He and Jake Darby each shot an unblemished four-for-four from the free throw line. Darby finished with 15 points and tied a season-high with seven assists. Justin Berry rounded out Newman's double-figure scorers with 10 points after a 10-for-12 effort from the charity stripe.

Josh Simmons and LaDustin Williams each scored 22 points to lead Arkansas-Fort Smith, while Simmons added seven boards to lead the Lions.

With the win, Newman improves to 12-4 on the season, and after Incarnate Word's 82-69 loss to St. Mary's, the Jets stand alone atop the Heartland Conference leader board. They are back in action Thursday when they travel to Odessa, Texas, to take on the Texas-Permian Basin Falcons. Tip-time at the Falcon Dome is slated for 8 p.m.