What happened: Xavier 74 - St Joseph's 54
Xavier came out of the gates cold against St. Joe's and let the Hawks stay in the game way too long. With 3:39 left in the first half, XU trailed 25-21. The Muskies took over from there, outscoring St. Joseph's 17-2 over the next seven minutes to effectively take control of the game. From there X never looked back, finally transforming a game against a second-tier foe into a yawner for their fans.
Cheek Lyons was a hero for the Muskies, posting 24-6-3 on 10-14/2-4/2-2 shooting with only one turnover. After averaging almost 18 points per game in a seven-game stretch, Lyons had been less than superb against Duquesne before foul trouble put him out of his misery. His 24 tonight were his biggest output since he posted 25 on Wofford in November, and it took three overtimes for him to put that performance together.
Big Kenny again played a superb first half, scoring 13 points and grabbing 5 boards. While his second half was once again bereft of performances that would merit the Kenny Frease YouTube highlight reel, he did manage to finish the game with 17-10-4, a block, and two turnovers.
Tu was not good tonight, getting his 14-5-7 on 2-10/1-4/9-9 shooting with three steals. He also contributed half of the team's 10 turnovers. Dante was back to anonymity, post 2-2-2 on 1-4/0-3/0-0. He can afford to have sleepy games like that against teams like St. Joseph's, but it would have been nice to see him continue his trend of hot shooting.
Odds and ends:
-X got a chance to clear the bench a little near the end of the game. Jay Canty and Jordan Latham both scored, and Johnny Mazza and Griffin McKenzie both avoided the dreaded trillion.
-Jeff Robinson still doesn't seem to be asserting himself on the offensive end, but it's not to see him post a seven rebound game from the bench.
-The Muskies were 17-18 from the line as a team; Jamel McLean was responsible for the lone miss.
-Despite weighing ten pounds less than Mark Lyons, St. Joe's forward CJ Aiken collected five blocks.
-Stay tuned for both full and Twitter recaps from Brad.
Next game: Saturday v. Fordham at 8pm.
No comments:
Post a Comment