The Norfolk State Spartans blow past Alabama A&M Bulldogs 81-66 to Advance to the CollegeInsider.com Tournament Championship.
“It was good to get a guy go to court get a W.” Head Coach Robert Jones said. “You know, obviously the last time we were on the court it was a loss, so we wanted to get that taste away from us. So it was good to get back. I know it took a little while it seemed like for us to really get back into competitive spirit. But once we got going it’s a basketball game, you’re competitive, You got to show up and play and I think that now, after the win the locker room was a little different. So in the locker room now wants to go try to win a championship. So I think we got our competitive juices back. We’ll be ready for Wednesday.”
With no Jamarii Thomas, Norfolk State received a surge from Darly Anderson who finished with 15 points all from downtown shooting 5-8 from 3 in the game and receiving the MVP award for the game.
The Spartans and the Bulldogs both started the game off slow. At the first Media timeout, the Bulldogs led 3-2.
Then the Bulldogs went on a 10-4 run to put them in the driver’s seat in the first half. The Spartans shot 11-34 only 32.4% in the first half struggling in ways they haven’t struggled all year with missed layups, and bad looks offensively.
“We just took better shots in the second half, you know, the first half and that’s what I told guys at halftime and we have a couple gentlemen on our team that were taking shots that they didn’t take all season. You know, it’s like all of a sudden, we just gonna just take those shots. No, we’re trying to win. You know, like I told you guys a couple days ago, if we’re gonna do this thing, we’re gonna try to win this thing. We’re not gonna just come and play and show up. But in the first half we felt like we were in that mode. You know, guys are just taking fade away sky hook shots and all types of stuff that they’re not supposed to take. And you know, we cleaned it up in a second and played the way we’ve been playing all year and the results were totally different. I mean, it was 18 point, you know, turnaround, you know, what we want by 18 and a half.”
The first half ended with the Spartans down 31-28.
In the second half, the Spartans came alive. The Spartans grabbed the lead with a 9-2 run to kick off the half. Daryl Anderson hit 2 threes during this run to give him 9 points in the game, but with his success came foul trouble. He picked up his 4th foul with 9 minutes left in the ball game, but Coach Jones decided to keep him in because he was hitting from 3.
“Honestly, I didn’t know I had four fouls.” Daryl Anderson said. “That’s probably better that I didn’t. Because I probably would have played like I had four fouls but now just I wanted to stay active and stay involved in the game. I hope my team any way I can.”
With under 9 minutes left, the Spartans grabbed their second lead of the game, but the Bulldogs fought back with an 8-4 run bringing the game within 2.
With about 7 minutes left, Daryl Anderson came down and hit 2 back to back threes for NSU and the crowd went crazy.
“Honestly is something that you know, we do a couple of times in practice.” Daryl Anderson said about his shots in transition. “I will look my guys and they’ll give me a look and I just know that the ball might be coming my direction and I was just ready for it and they felt good and was able to knock them down.”
After Daryl’s 2 three-pointers, the Spartans dominated the rest of the game outscoring the Bulldogs 26-13, and winning the game 81-66.
The Spartans shot 63% in the second half.
In addition to Jamarii Thomas being out, Tyrese Jenkins was not seen on the sideline during today’s contest. “I don’t know I think he opted out, He never told me so.”
The Spartans will play the winner of Purdue Fort Wayne (22-12) vs Tarleton State (25-9) in the Championship of the C.I.T.
The game will either be held Wednesday or Thursday location and time TBD.
Spartan Echo 