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Basketball Uses Balanced Scoring Attack To Defeat First-Place Elon, 87-78

Feb. 11, 2012

Box Score

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - For the third time this season, the Samford University basketball team finished with five players scoring in double figures as the Bulldogs registered an 87-78 victory over the Elon Phoenix on Saturday in a key Southern Conference North Division showdown held in front of 2,572 red-clad fans at the Pete Hanna Center.

Samford's attendance marked the second largest crowd in Pete Hanna Center history. The largest attendance in school history occurred Jan. 31, 2009, as the Bulldogs played host to Stephen Curry and the Davidson Wildcats.

"We did a great job of knocking down shots, but we also did a great job of bouncing back from a very difficult loss on Thursday," said Samford head coach Jimmy Tillette. "We all left the locker room and we were devastated. We came in here yesterday and practiced hard and got ready to face this really tough Elon team. I'm really proud of our team tonight because we played well against a very good team."

With Saturday's win, Samford (10-15, 7-7 SoCon) earned the season sweep of Elon (13-12, 8-6 SoCon) and bounced back from its hard-fought 71-69 loss to UNCG on Thursday.

The Bulldogs have been victorious in seven of their previous 10 games, including five of their last seven. Samford also improved to 7-1 all-time against Elon. The Bulldogs have never lost to the Phoenix at home and moved their record to 4-0 when squaring off in the Pete Hanna Center.

Samford finished with five players scoring in double figures Saturday and were paced offensively by redshirt freshman Tyler Hood's 20 points on 7-of-12 shooting from the floor. Hood, the Bulldogs' native of Kingston, Tenn., also knocked down five 3-point field goals and added four rebounds, two assists and a steal.

Earlier this season, Hood dropped in a career-high 25 points against Elon as the Bulldogs earned an 86-80 victory Jan. 19, in Elon, N.C.

On Saturday, Samford's Drew Windler and Raijon Kelly both tallied 16 points. Windler, the Bulldogs' talented 6-foot-9 center from South Milwaukee, Wis., finished 4-of-8 from the field, 3-of-5 from 3-point range and 5-of-6 from the charity stripe. Kelly, Samford's explosive true freshman guard from St. Paul, Minn., compiled 16 points, three assists and three steals in 36 minutes of playing time.

Jeffrey Merritt, the Bulldogs' senior Team Captain, nearly recorded a triple-double Saturday. Samford's native of Oklahoma City, Okla., finished the victory with 11 points, nine assists, six rebounds and two steals. Merritt was also 5-of-9 from the floor and played a team-high 37 minutes.

Samford's Will Cook also registered 11 points, while true freshman Devin McNeil and senior Matthew Friday both provided a spark off the bench with seven and five points, respectively.

"I thought our starters were great tonight and we also got some great production off the bench from Devin McNeil and Matthew Friday," Tillette said. "McNeil gave us some good minutes there in the first half and Friday played great on both ends of the floor."

After a slow start to open the game, Samford caught fire late in the first half and led by as many as 15 points, 38-23, with 2:29 left to go in the opening period. Elon then used a 3-point play from Brett Ervin, and four points from Lucas Troutman to head into the break trailing 40-30.

The Phoenix connected on 10-of-15 of its 3-point attempts in the second half of play and trimmed Samford's lead to 69-66 with 5:43 remaining in the game. Following a 30-second timeout from the Bulldogs, Merritt turned in a clutch 3-point play and Windler and Kelly knocked down 3-point field goals to give Samford a 78-71 advantage.

During the same stretch, Elon's Ervin hit a 3-pointer and Drew Spradlin connected on a 12-foot jumper.

The Phoenix's Jack Isenbarger led all scorers with 21 points as all of his points came off 3-point baskets. Elon's sophomore sharpshooter from Zionsville, Ind., connected on 7-of-14 of his attempts from beyond the arc and also handed out six assists.

Following Isenbarger's stellar shooting performance, Elon received 19 bench points from Ervin, 14 from Spradlin and 10 from Sebastian Koch.

The Phoenix shot 51.9 percent from 3-point land Saturday and 49.1 percent from the field. Elon also finished with a game-high 23 assists.

"In the second half, it was like Elon wasn't going to miss a shot," said Tillette. "They made 10-of-15 from the arc and I thought our guys really showed great poise down the stretch when they cut it to three at 69-66. We did a great job of making our free throws tonight and that was a huge factor for us."

With Samford leading 78-71 with 2:52 remaining, the Phoenix started fouling the Bulldogs and sent Cook to the line with 1:11 to play. Cook drained both free throws as Samford closed out the game shooting 9-of-10 from the charity line to solidify the Bulldogs' 87-78 triumph.

Samford finished Saturday's contest shooting 15-of-18 from the free-throw line. The Bulldogs out-rebounded Elon 29-24 and only turned the ball over 10 times.

Samford outscored the Phoenix in points in the paint 28-16, points off turnovers 24-16, and second-chance points, 16-3. The Bulldogs also turned in a 56.6 shooting percentage from the field and a 44.4-percent outing from 3-point range. Samford's 87 points scored was its highest total in SoCon play this season.

"We're a much better offensive rebounding team this season than we have been in years past," Tillette said. "This was a tough stretch of games for us and now we have to get ready to play a very good Davidson team, which will also be tough. We have four games left in the regular season with three of them on the road, so it's going to be a tough row to hoe, but we'll continue to practice hard and hopefully get better each day."

The Samford University basketball team will next be in action Wednesday at 6 p.m. (CST) as the Bulldogs travel to North Carolina for a highly-anticipated matchup against the Davidson Wildcats to be held in Belk Arena (5,223) in Davidson, N.C.

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