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The USF Bulls (3-0) dominated from start to finish as they beat the Florida Southern Mocs (0-1) 73-43 tonight at the Lakeland Center. Augustus Gilchrist lead a balanced USF scoring attack with 15 points, while Blake Nash and Toarlyn Fitzpatrick provided some quality production off the bench with 13 and 12 points respectively.
USF was clearly the superior team tonight, and it showed from opening tip. USF rushed out to a quick 14-4 lead, and the Bulls never let the Mocs in the game. FSC was clearly bothered by USF's size advantage, and only shot 26% on the night. The Mocs were even worse from behind the arc, making only 1 of 20 attempts from 3. The Bulls were able to get high quality shots most of the night, and were able to connect on 48% of them. The Bulls were even better from 3 where they shot 50% from downtown. USF also had a clear advantage on the glass, outrebounding FSC 53-35. Ron Anderson Jr. led way on the boards with 11 rebounds.
Couple of thoughts from the game:
- USF was the dominant team on paper, and they came out and immediately went out and showed it.
- The ball movement on the team was pretty awesome. USF had 19 assists on 29 field goals. Our bigs had 11 of the 19 dimes, led by Ron Anderson Jr's 4.
- Still have to work on free throw shooting. After looking like they had returned to form on Monday, the Bulls were only 8-15 from the charity stripe. I'm sure Heath will be working on this as the Bulls will need to hit their freebies to close out games this season.
- LaBlanthony Conasity was excellent once again, going 19 PTS/8 REB/5 AST while only committing 3 turnovers. Anthony Collins was not available tonight, but he should be ready to go this weekend.
- Awesome to see Alberto Damour get some playing time tonight. The senior walk-on made the most of his four minutes on the court, scoring 4 points while grabbing 2 rebounds.
The Bulls will now head up to Uncasville, Connecticut to play the final two games of the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame Tip-ff this weekend. The first game will be against Old Dominion on Saturday at 2:00 PM.