MOBILE, Ala. — South Alabama opened the 2013-14 season with a 74-58 win over Detroit at the Mitchell Center, giving Matthew Graves the first victory of his head coaching career.
The win extended South Alabama’s streak of home-opener victories to 22 consecutive seasons.
Ammons, Allen Lead the Way
Junior Mychal Ammons recorded the sixth double-double of his career with 13 points and a career-high 14 rebounds. He added two blocks and made his only 3-point attempt.
Senior Antoine Allen led the Jaguars with 17 points, 11 of them in the first half, and made 4 of 5 shots from 3-point range. Freshman Aakim Saintil scored 12 points with two assists off the bench.
Defense Smothers Detroit
South Alabama held Detroit to 28.9 percent shooting for the game and 25.6 percent in the second half. The Titans made just 1 of 14 3-point attempts.
Detroit led only briefly, going ahead 3-2 on a 3-pointer by Juwan Howard Jr. The Jaguars regained the lead on the next possession and never trailed again.
Saintil sparked a 14-3 run midway through the first half, scoring nine of those points in a four-minute span. A 13-2 run in the second half, with six different Jaguars scoring, pushed the lead to 22 points.
South Alabama committed 15 turnovers after turning the ball over 24 times in Tuesday’s exhibition against Mobile.
Rubit Sets School Rebounding Mark
Augustine Rubit finished with nine points and 12 rebounds. It was his 52nd career game with double-digit rebounds, breaking a tie with Terry Catledge for the most in school history.
Rubit moved into seventh place on the Sun Belt Conference’s career rebounding list with 903, nine shy of sixth. He is also seven points from moving into sixth on South Alabama’s career scoring list.
Graves Pleased With Effort
“First and foremost, I was really proud of our team’s effort,” Graves said. “I thought they came out right from the start and played aggressive. They shared the basketball and I was so happy to see us go from taking a good shot to taking a great shot. In the first half, I think we had eight assists on 13 field goals, which is outstanding. Defensively, we did a great job rebounding the basketball, especially from our guards’ standpoint. Our guards had over half of our defensive rebounds.”
“I would be remiss not to mention our defensive effort,” Graves said. “This is the second game in a row that we held a team under 30 percent field goal percentage. And if we continue to do that night in and night out it’s not going to matter what we shoot.”
Graves credited a Wednesday film session after the Mobile exhibition and said his post players are still adjusting to handling the ball on the perimeter. “I think our bigs will continue to get more comfortable handling the ball,” he said. “I think ultimately our guards at the end there need to understand time and score and shot selection a little more. I think that will come with those young guys.”
Up Next
South Alabama travels to Texas for a game Tuesday, Nov. 12, at 7 p.m., televised on the Longhorn Network.
