Tigers race past Mustangs 63-45

AP: Mark Weber

 

After a demoralizing defeat to UCF this past Wednesday in the final seconds, the University of Memphis Tigers basketball team (13-6, 4-1in Conference USA) rebounded and got a much needed win over the SMU Mustangs, (10-9, 2-3 in C-USA) 63-45 at FedExForum. Sophomore guard Will Barton paced the Tigers with 24 points, five rebounds and 3assists. He also led the team with alley-oop plays with three electrifying dunks.

After shooting 12-for-31 (38.7 percent) and 2-for-11 (18.2 percent) Memphis came out of halftime pretty much the same, though they were able to find a way to win what was an ugly game. Memphis shot 42.6 percent in the second half and clamped down on the mustangs in the process. SMU shot an abysmal 32.6 percent from the field, (15-for-46) including 18.5 percent from downtown.

"That's a tough style to play, especially coming off that loss to Central Florida on Wednesday," said Josh Pastner, head coach of the Tigers. "I told my guys that we can't get into a three point shooting contest with them and we did do that in the first half. We're better when we take 10 or 11 three pointers, not when we're shooting 16."

The game did get a bit easier for Tigers fans down the stretch. A series of stops in the second half after both teams failed to take control of the game led to the Tigers opening up the lead on the Mustangs, a 21-2 run, eventually closed any hopes for a comeback by SMU.

"We just wanted to take out they're three point shooting, said Chris Crawford, sophomore guard for the Tigers. Coach told us coming out of halftime that the main focus was to stop the three."

Crawford, who finished with only five points and one rebound, affected the game in other areas. His task was to guard SMU's Robert Nyakundi and shut down the prolific scorer. Nyakundi finished with 10 points on 4-of-17 shooting and four rebounds.

Though many would say that tonight's game for the Tigers wasn't due to defense, rather that SMU was just ineffective from the field, Pastner believes his teams has made tremendous strides on the defensive end of the floor.

"We had hands in their face, we made them alter their shots," Pastner said. "If you just take a look at the numbers of our team from the Christmas break until now, we're a totally different team - night and day different from where we were in Maui when we were scoring points but not winning. If you look at the stats, you would think this team should be 16-3 or 17-2, not 13-6 - and that's what's frustrating.

Tigers' next game is Wednesday at FedExForum when they host the Rice Owls. Tipoff is scheduled for 7 p.m.