Elon sophomore guard Lucas Weavil missed two three-pointers in the final minute and a half of play Monday night.

But it was irrelevant. It was all fine with Phoenix senior guard Drew Spradlin.

“It’s one of the best feelings in the world to know you took care of everything you wanted to take care of,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about it for the last minute or two. Those guys deserve it.”

Each Phoenix player got minutes on the floor as Elon took care of business against the Appalachian State Mountaineers Monday night, overwhelming its Southern Conference foe 82-59 in Alumni Gym, winning their third straight game.

The game was a rematch of a contest nine days ago in which Appalachian State handed Elon a brutal 81-66 loss in which Phoenix head coach Matt Matheny’s club was outworked, outshot and out-rebounded. It was also the first time the Phoenix has beaten the Mountaineers since Feb. 18, 2008.

“I felt like in game one, they could do what they wanted to do and that we didn’t defend them very well and they took advantage of that,” Matheny said. “I felt like they got a few things tonight, but I felt like we were much more active, we were much more aware of what they were trying to do, and I thought we did a good job of making it difficult for them to do what they were trying to do. We took them out of their flow, out of their sets and made them try to create other than just running their stuff. They ran their stuff very effectively on us in game one.”

This was evidenced by the limitation of production from Mountaineers senior guard Omar Carter, junior guard Jamaal Trice and senior forward Andre Williamson. The trio that combined for 49 points, Trice and Carter with 20 each, against Elon Jan. 28 only had 11 points total Monday night. Appalachian State junior forward Nathan Healy led the Mountaineers with 14 points.

“You can’t let them play their game, because if you let them play their game, they’ll end up with 20,” Elon sophomore guard Sebastian Koch said.

“You really need to crowd both of them and make them drivers because they’re really good in mid-range,” Spradlin added.

Spradlin and Koch had great games of their own. Koch was on fire, scoring 21 points and adding four rebounds. Spradlin chipped in 18 points and four rebounds on a night when the Phoenix out-rebounded their opponents 38-28, 13 of those coming offensively.

“We did a great job going to the offensive glass, rebounding,” Koch said. “That opens up the shooters.”

Koch was one of those shooters. He was 7-11 from the field for the game, 4-7 from three-point range. He took a lot of wide-open shots, particularly early in the first half, when he had eight points in a game-opening 18-5 run in the first 6:54.

“It seemed like every wide open one was him,” Spradlin said. “I was looking up and was like, ‘He’s wide open again.’”

The Phoenix got balanced scoring in their third game without freshman point guard Austin Hamilton, who is still recovering from a bout with mononucleosis. Sophomore guard Jack Isenbarger, who scored a career-high 34 points against The Citadel Saturday night, had 11 points and seven assists. Sophomore forwards Ryley Beaumont and Lucas Troutman combined for 19 points and eleven rebounds.

“There was concern when we knew Austin was out because it changes things, changes the plays that you run or how you get into your offense,” Matheny said. “So with him being out, we needed guys to step up and that’s what we’ve gotten, whether it’s Jack, Drew, Lucas, Sebastian, Ryley, our team has stepped up.”

With the win, the Phoenix extended its first place North Division lead over UNC-Greensboro, who did not play Monday night, to one game. But as has been protocol most of the year, Matheny and his players are not looking at the standings all that much.

“What’s it really matter?” Spradlin said. “I looked at the standings yesterday for the first time this year. I want to win as many games as we can win. It’s cool (that Elon is in first place) but at the end of the day, it’s not really relevant. We’re trying to play the best basketball we can play and win as many games so that when we go into March, we will be playing the best we can play.”

Sounding like the New York Giants, who won the Super Bowl Sunday night after winning their last six games?

“We talked about the Giants a little bit,” Spradlin admitted.