The second career double-double for Pierre Brooks II and a 41-8 second-half advantage lifted Butler to a 78-39 win over Merrimack Friday night at Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.
 
Brooks scored a game-high 23 points and pulled down a career-best 12 rebounds, leading five Bulldogs in double figures.
 
The last time that Butler limited an opponent to 10 points or less in a half was in the 2001 NCAA Tournament when head coach Thad Matta's Bulldogs led Wake Forest by a 43-10 margin after 20 minutes.
 
Butler improves to 4-1 on the season and will now head to the Arizona Tip-Off for the Thanksgiving holiday.
 
HOW IT TRANSPIRED:

• A 14-4 run gave the Bulldogs a 37-25 lead with 3:14 remaining in the first half, which was also Butler's largest advantage of the opening stanza. Merrimack would score the final six points of the first half to give Butler a 37-31 lead after 20 minutes.
• Brooks made his first six shots en route to 15 first-half points.
• Butler held Merrimack scoreless for the first 8:31 of the second half as the prolonged run helped the Bulldogs build a 47-31 lead.
• Butler kept forcing Merrimack misses over the final 20 minutes as the Warriors shot 4-for-29 from the field in the second half (13.8 percent), including an 0-for-11 mark from three-point range.

 
NOTEWORTHY:

• Merrimack made three of its first five attempts from behind the arc (which all occurred in the first four minutes of the game) and then missed their next 16 three-point attempts.
• Butler held a 51-23 rebounding advantage. In addition to the 12 rebounds by Brooks, Andre Screen tied his season-high with nine.
• Screen narrowly missed a double-double with 12 points.
• Brooks went 9-for-14 from the field and made four of his five attempts from three-point range.
• Jahmyl Telfort and Patrick McCaffery each scored 11 points. Brooks and McCaffery have both scored in double figures in each of Butler's five games this season.
• Butler made 22 of its 31 free throw attempts; Merrimack went 2-for-7 from the charity stripe.
• Evan Haywood scored 10 points – the first 10 points of his Butler career – which included a 7-for-8 mark from the free throw line.
• Kolby King handed out seven assists. 

 
UP NEXT: The Bulldogs head west to celebrate Thanksgiving at the Arizona Tip-Off. Butler will meet Northwestern on Thanksgiving night at 7 p.m. (Eastern). The Bulldogs will also be in action the following night, meeting either Mississippi State or UNLV. Both games will air on CBS Sports Network, while the audio broadcast featuring Mark Minner and Nick Garder will stream on The Varsity Network.