By Jason Pugh, Northwestern State Assistant Athletic Director for Media Relations; featured photo by Chris Reich, NSU Photographic Services
BEAUMONT, Texas – The Northwestern State men’s basketball team started quickly Saturday evening in its Southland Conference opener at Lamar.
A sluggish offensive finish to the first half allowed the host Cardinals to gather momentum, and Lamar carried that through a strong second half to hand the Demons a 90-70 defeat inside Neches Arena at the Montagne Center.
“It’s been the story of our season,” first-year head coach Rick Cabrera said. “We’ve got to do a lot of soul searching. I’ve got to do a lot of soul searching. It’s on me. I’ve got to figure out how to get my team to play for 40 minutes. I’ve seen it before. We didn’t come out victorious, but we gave ourselves a chance. There’s no other option.”
Junior guard Cliff Davis lived up to his billing as the Southland’s most prolific 3-point shooter, sparking the Demons’ fast start with five first-half 3s. His final long-range bucket of the opening half gave Northwestern State (2-12, 0-1) the second of two eight-point leads in the first half with 6:36 to play.
Lamar (7-7, 1-0) answered Davis’ basket with 7-2 surge to get within one possession before striking with a game-changing 10-0 run across the final 2:55 of the half.
After Davis’ sixth 3-pointer of the game pulled NSU within three less than 90 seconds into the second halalf, Lamar used a 7-1 run across the next two minutes to build a nine-point lead.
The Cardinals entered the game ranked 12thnationally in fast-break points per game at 16.8. The Demons won that battle in the first half, outscoring Lamar 13-10.
That changed in the second half as the Cardinals outscored NSU in transition 11-2, part of a final 20 minutes in which Lamar shot 58 percent from the field, including 15-for-20 aim inside the arc. Lamar also won the turnover battle by five and turned NSU’s 19 giveaways into 28 points, a 13-point advantage for the Cardinals in that category.
The Demons, meanwhile, slipped from shooting 52.2 percent from the field in the opening 20 minutes to 40 percent from the floor in the second half. NSU also connected on just 16 of 30 free throws in a game that saw 52 fouls called between the teams.
Davis led Northwestern State with 27 points, connecting on 7 of 11 3-point shots, while Duane Posey added 10. Adam Hamilton paced a balanced Lamar attack with 18 points and a game-high 12 rebounds as the Cardinals placed five players – Hamilton, B.B. Knight (16), Terry Anderson (15), Chris Pryor (12) and Ja’Sean Jackson (10) – in double figures.
“Cliff is dynamite,” Cabrera said. “He carries us offensively. We need some other guys to step up and help him, but most of all we need to defend. We need to stop the other team from scoring, so we can get some points offensively. We’ll get better. We’ll learn from this. We’re going to win some games.”
The Demons return to action Monday when they host McNeese in their Southland Conference home opener. Tipoff is set for 6:30 p.m. in Prather Coliseum.