As the regular season winds down toward the post season, the Golden Eagles find themselves in a must-win, one-game season each outing. At 15-9 and tied for the No. 9 spot in USCAA D2, the onus is on KSU Tusc to earn their own way into the big dance.
Currently riding a three-game winning streak, the navy and gold had to clear another hurdle on Saturday afternoon in Founders Hall Gym. And they knew it wouldn't be easy because Ohio University Lancaster made things uncomfortable for one half of their matchup in December, but a 57-point second half outburst by the Eagles wiped out a 40-40 halftime deadlock and catapulted them to a 97-78 win.
This time it was quite different as winners of three straight, the Golden Eagles blared the war trumpets early and wasted little time in exploiting their familiar home court surroundings, as they rained home a season high 16 three-balls in a 108-59 shellacking of the Cougars.
Heeding the call of the trumpets, KSU Tusc cued up a series of near apocalyptic events as they pressured the turnover and cold shooting plagued Cougars while mounting a 12-0 lead. They almost couldn't miss and scored off the opening tip on a London Cobbs layup and a picture-perfect backdoor dunk on their second possession by DeJuan Lawrence via a sweet bounce pass in traffic from JaJuantae Young. The 6'8" Lawrence returned the favor to Young with a big-to-small backdoor bounce pass of his own from the left wing just a minute later. The bucket was sandwiched in between triples by Kameron Shockley and Braden Rostad, before OUL finally got off the mat with their first score at 16:09 left in the first half.
At one point, the Eagles had hammered out a 23-8 lead, but that was before Cobbs ran wild. In KSU Tusc's final 10 possessions of the opening half, he was instrumental in scoring 13 points on six of those offensive sets. He started it off with a straight-line drive to the rack from the top of the wheel, and then capitalized on a theft by driving the length of the court for a lay in. He followed those baskets with a clever hesitation move in the lane that baited OUL's big man to commit and promptly dribbled past him for an easy basket and finally capped it all off by drilling home a three with 1:22 left for a 47-30 lead.
The half ended with the navy and gold on top 47-33.
OUL started the final session with a 5-0 run to make the deficit a little more manageable, but the Eagles erupted for 14 straight points that spelled woe for the visitors who suddenly found themselves in a huge hole, 61-38. It was like the seventh trumpet blared to signal Rome was falling all over again as Kameron Shockley hit a twisting off balance lay up, backed up by two consecutive Rostad triples from distance---the first from the right corner and the second from the left bend.
Over the final 20 minutes, the Eagles drained nine triples with five of them coming off the hands of nonstarters. Ethan Bower connected on three long bombs, while Kyle Shockley and Rostad both added a pair as well. The good guys also held the Cougars to just 26 second half points, while lighting up the scoreboard with 61 of their own.
A James Roundtree basket off a drive from the top of the key gave KSU Tusc their largest lead of the game (45 points) with 2:22 left to play.
Six Golden Eagles scored in double digits and accounted for 88 of the team's 108 points. Leading the way was Kameron Shockley with 19, Cobbs had 17, Bower ended with 15, Kyle Shockley scored 14 (all after halftime), Young had 12 and Rostad 11.
On Wednesday, February 22, the Eagles (16-9) travel to Central State University near Dayton to take on the NCAA DII Marauders at 6 pm, before coming back home to finish the season with three-straight home games.
London Cobbs scored 17 points and gets free from an OUL defender while JaJuantae Young added 12 and races upcourt with the ball.
DeJuan Lawrence throws one down and James Roundtree waits his turn to get onto the court against the Cougars.
(Photos by Amber Peltz)