Last Tuesday was Jeff Green’s 2006-07 coming out party. Saturday was Roy Hibbert’s.

After Green had a breakout performance against James Madison earlier in the week, Georgetown’s other unanimous all-Big East first-team junior had a huge game Saturday afternoon, putting up a season-high 23 points and 11 rebounds to lead Georgetown (6-3) past Oral Roberts (4-4) at Verizon Center, 73-58.

“Hibbert was terrific, we couldn’t stop him,” Oral Roberts Head Coach Scott Sutton said of the Hoyas’ 7-foot-2 center. “Obviously he’s going to be a pro.”

With his second double-double of the season, Hibbert was just a basket shy of his career-high 25 points, which he put up last season against Rutgers. He also handed out a season-high three assists and threw down five dunks for his most complete and aggressive performance this year.

“He was incredible,” Green said of fellow Wooden Award-watch candidate. “He did the little things – rebounding, assists, hit the open guy, and whenever he needed to score, he scored. It was big for us for him to get a good start.”

Hibbert and the Hoyas got off to a quick start, jumping out to a 14-2 lead in the first seven minutes. Using a full-court trap on defense, Georgetown was able to unsettle Oral Roberts and cause five turnovers during that stretch while making shots on the other end of the floor, including three-pointers from freshman forward DaJuan Summers and junior guard Jonathan Wallace and two fastbreak dunks from Green.

“I thought [our start] was huge,” Georgetown Head Coach John Thompson III said. “[Oral Roberts] is a terrific team. They have shown that they can play with anyone in the country. We were fortunate to cause some early turnovers and get off to that start.”

The Golden Eagles rallied, and pulled within six points midway through the first half, but the Hoyas were too much to handle and stretched their lead back out to as many as 22 points, taking a 40-20 lead into halftime.

“The first half we were just awful,” Sutton said. “You can’t dig yourself that big a hole against a good team and come back on the road.”

Hibbert led the way in the first half, setting the tone for his teammates by grabbing contested rebounds and slamming home authoritative dunks. Green had a solid opening stanza as well, tallying nine points and four rebounds.

The Golden Eagles’ best player, senior forward Caleb Green, was quiet in the first half, putting up only six points on 2-of-6 shooting from the field. Green entered the contest averaging 21 points per game and was held way below that point by Hibbert, Jeff Green, Summers and freshman forward Vernon acklin, who all spent time trying to contain him.

“Caleb Green is a terrific player, and in looking at tapes of him, I didn’t know how we were going to contain him,” Thompson said. “We wanted to give him some different looks. Roy did a very good job defending him.”

In the second half the Hoyas came out slow, a habit that has haunted the team all season. Within the first four minutes the Golden Eagles were able to cut the Hoyas’ lead to 12 on a 10-to-2 run, but unlike in previous games, Georgetown did not wilt under pressure. Hibbert made a layup and Green followed with a dunk as the Hoyas took their lead back out to near 20 points.

The Golden Eagles would not go away, however, and twice got the lead back down near single-digits. With under five minutes remaining Oral Roberts only trailed by 10. Again it was Hibbert who responded, this time with a dunk and then an assist on a bounce pass to a cutting sophomore swingman Marc Egerson for two.

“Good teams are going to make runs, especially teams with that much talent,” Thompson said. “I told our guys at halftime that they were not going away. That’s the ebb and flow of the game. Our guys have to know that sort of thing is going to happen. They have to continue to grow and get that experience.”

With 3:41 remaining and Georgetown leading by 16 points, the Golden Eagles could not put together another run and sent the Hoyas to the line six times in the final minute, before the horn sounded with Georgetown on top 73-58.

Hibbert paced all scorers with his 23, followed by the Golden Eagles’ senior guard Ken Tutt who tallied 21, including 15 in the second half. Both Jeff Green and Caleb Green had 15 points on the night (though Jeff’s came far more efficiently, as he finished the afternoon 7-of-12 from the floor, compared to Caleb’s 5-of-15), with Wallace and Egerson both finishing in double digits for the Hoyas as well.

After a smooth first half with eight assists and eight turnovers, the Hoyas were not as sound in the second, committing 11 turnovers and dishing out only nine assists. Many of those turnovers were forced by the Golden Eagles’ pressure defense, which exposed the Hoyas inexperience handling such a defensive style. Georgetown also got in foul trouble, with both Summers and Wallace fouling out, and Hibbert picking up four.

Georgetown has the week off and will return to action on Saturday night, facing off against Winston-Salem State at 7:30 p.m. in McDonough Gymnasium.