Florida 69, Georgia Southern 49
GAINESVILLE, Fla. - The Georgia Southern men's basketball team won the first half against Florida Wednesday night, despite the score, but it couldn't walk out of the Stephen C. O'Connell Center a winner. In the Gainesville Regional game of the Legends Classic, the Eagles controlled the first half, holding the Gators to 25.8 percent field goal shooting, but poor shooting by the Eagles and second-half foul trouble opened the door for a 69-49 Florida win. Georgia Southern led for most of the first half, by as many as four points, while frustrating the Gators with hard-nosed defense. At times Florida was shooting as low as 17 percent in the first period, including 0-9 from behind the arc.
The Eagles delivered the first blow, building a four-point lead over the first seven minutes and kept the margin at three, mingled with six ties throughout the first half. Junior forward Rory Spencer (Atlanta, Ga.) had 11 points off three layups and five free throws. Georgia Southern as a team shot only 32 percent in the first half, and that, combined with 10 free throws gave Florida a slim 26-25 lead at the half.
Opening the second half, the Eagles scored the first five points to take a four-point lead before missing their next six shots. Kenny Boynton started the Florida run with two field goals of his own and an assist on a Vernon Macklin dunk. A jumper by senior guard Antoine Johnson (Atlanta, Ga.) broke the first scoring drought with the Eagles behind 32-39. Within the next 19 seconds Johnson would pick up his third foul and the Eagles leading rebounder Cameron Baskerville (Marietta, Ga.) would pick up his fourth, putting them both on the bench. Florida extended its lead to 12, 48-36, off two Macklin layups and buoyed by nine points from the charity stripe.
"Wins and losses don't always measure your growth," said first-year head coach Charlton Young. "We are preparing ourselves by playing the best.
We want to win, but it is also important for us to learn. These two games have been tough, but we have learned a lot - we have learned what it takes to play at this level."
For the second straight game, senior guard Antonio Hanson hit three three-point shots in the second half, hitting two back-to-back to cut the lead to seven at 7:15. Georgia Southern went 1-6 with only a Willie Powers (Gainesville, Ga.) layup and Florida was 1-4 over the next four minutes. With 2:38 left in the half, Florida had built a 13-point lead and Johntavious Rucker (Decatur, Ga.) and Baskerville were within seconds of fouling out.
Spencer lead the Eagles with 13 points and had seven rebounds, and Hanson finished with 11 points, nine in the second half. Baskerville posted his third straight double-figure rebounding game with 10. With the Eagles in foul trouble, Florida went to the free throw line 43 times and connected on 29. Boynton scored 15 of his game-high 22 points in the second period with Chandler Parson and Vernon Macklin contributing 15 each.
Georgia Southern, now 1-2, ends its three-game road trip at Jacksonville State on Saturday with a 5 p.m. contest against the 1-1 Gamecocks.
Texas 73, Western Carolina 41
AUSTIN, Texas - Damion James led four Longhorns in double-figures with a game-high 18 points as No. 3 Texas erased an early Western Carolina lead en route to a 73-41 victory Wednesday night at the Frank Erwin Center. The Catamounts struggled to find rhythm offensively, only mustering 26-percent shooting from the field in the loss.
Red-shirt sophomore Harouna Mutombo was the lone Catamount to reach double figures, scoring 10 points and leading the squad with eight rebounds. The Pickering, Ontario native added four steals and a pair of assists for WCU. Senior Adrian Gailliard chipped in eight points off the bench, while junior Richie Gordon scored six and boarded seven in the losing effort.
"From a competitive standpoint for the entire ball game, we competed very, very well and actually played pretty solid defense for most of the game" said WCU fifth-year head coach Larry Hunter during a post-game interview on the Catamount Sports Network. "(Texas) presents many match-up problems, but I felt our guys battled in there with them and forced 20-plus turnovers and did okay defensively. We just have got to get something going offensively."
Among Western Carolina's offensive struggles was a 3-for-19 (15.8%) performance behind the 3-point arc. However, defensively the Catamounts forced 21 Longhorn turnovers including 11 steals collectively.
James scored eight of his team-high 18 points from the free throw line, recording 11 points in the second half. J'Covan Brown, Gary Johnson and Varez Ward each scored 10 points, with Johnson pulling down seven rebounds as Texas (2-0) won the battle of the boards, 47-to-32. The Longhorns scored 40 of its 73 points inside the paint.
Western Carolina (1-1) pulled out to a three-point lead on two occasions inside the game's opening five minutes, leading 11-8 at the 15:16 mark of the first half. However, the third-ranked Longhorns managed to outscore WCU 33-to-8 to take their largest lead of the opening 20 minutes at 22, 41-to-19.
With five minutes remaining before the break, senior Brigham Waginger tallied one of his two steals and fed junior Mike Williams for a highlight reel alley-oop slam dunk to close the gap to 13, 28-15. But, that would be as close as the Catamounts would get the remainder of the game.
WCU missed its first seven shots from the field before Gailliard connected on a pair of free throws at the 16:27 mark for its first points of the second stanza. And it wasn't until the 13:32 mark that Gailliard connected on a jumper in the paint for Western's first field goal after halftime.
All told, WCU missed its first 10 shots from the floor in the second half and only managed 7-of-31 (22.6%) shooting after halftime.
Western Carolina will host the sub-regional round of the O'Reilly Auto Parts CBE Classic beginning Monday, Nov. 23 through Wednesday, Nov. 25 in the Ramsey Center in Cullowhee. The Catamounts will welcome Arkansas-Monticello, Binghamton and Duquesne for three days of double-headers with games beginning at 5:00 pm each day with WCU taking to the court at 7:30 pm.