Hustling Jaguars top North Texas

mgsteve · December 4, 2003

By JOSEPH SCHIEFELBEIN

jschiefelbein@theadvocate.com

Advocate sportswriter

Southern forward Nicholas Egland found himself parallel to the basketball court. Two, maybe three, North Texas players, were underneath him as Egland, to a degree, did some impromptu body surfing.

The important thing to Egland was that he had the rebound in his hands. Even better, after flicking the ball ahead, the ball flowed quickly down the court, with Pete Cipriano flushing a dunk and a 17-point lead in the last minute of the first half.

That's the kind of effort first-year coach Michael Grant craves, and that's the kind of effort that underpinned a 75-58 victory Wednesday night at the F.G. Clark Activity Center.

"We wanted to come out with the intensity we have in practice," Egland said.

Tim Johnson had 19 points on 7-for-11 shooting. Egland had 12 points, while Trayvean Scott had 11 points and seven rebounds. And Cipriano added 10 points, 10 rebounds, three assists and two blocks as Southern (2-2) won its second straight game.

"We played a complete game," Grant said. "I'm proud of my team, because they came ready to play. And this was a good team (Southern beat)."

Justin Barnett led Sun Belt Conference member UNT (3-2) with 12 points, while Michael DeGrate and Michael Jones added 10 apiece.

"They came out with a lot of energy," said third-year UNT coach Johnny Jones, a former LSU player and a longtime assistant under Dale Brown (who came to the game). "We made some adjustments at halftime and tried to press a little more. We just didn't execute at the other end."

The Jaguars trailed only once, at 2-0. After a 4-4 tie, they started pulling away with a modest 6-0 spurt. From there, shooting 55.9 percent and with only four turnovers in the first half, they kept pushing the lead.

Southern led 44-26 at halftime and took its largest lead at 46-26 on Johnson's jumper with 19:15 left in the game.

"Everything was really within our offense," Grant said. "They really played team basketball today."

UNT chipped away to within 65-56 on DeGrate's monster jam of an inbounds pass with 5:21 to play. That closed a four-point trip, with the Mean Green getting possession on a jump ball after Leonard Hopkins' missed a free throw on what could have been a three-point play.

But Southern held UNT to one basket the rest of the way. The Mean Green shot 1-for-10 and had a traveling violation.

"I'm very proud of the defensive end. We caused them a lot of problems," said Grant, who said he emphasized picking up UNT at halfcourt down the stretch.

After UNT's only score down the stretch, Southern scored on three straight trips.

Johnson slammed home an alley- oop pass from Jerimie Collier. Scott scored on a short pull-up jumper that followed a hard drive as the Jaguars milked the shot clock down. And after Egland missed the front end of a one-and-one, Collier got the offensive rebound, with the ball worked around to Johnson, who drained a 3-pointer from the left wing for a 74-58 lead with 1:49 left.

"Our main concern was putting together two halves like we did tonight," Johnson said. "Coach said every team would have their spurts. They made theirs. Then it was our turn to keep our composure."

CAMPBELL OUT: Junior 6-foot-8 center Jerrid Campbell, a second-team All-Southwestern Athletic Conference preseason selection, may be out for the season with torn tendons in his left foot.

Campbell started practicing last month, but has played sparingly. He averaged 11.3 minutes and 2.0 points in the first three games. He did not dress for the game Wednesday.

"Jerrid's still hurting bad right now," Grant said. "He's not helping us. We're taking him to the doctor again and seeing if he needs surgery. I'm looking at it as trying to get him a medical redshirt this year. He's not going to help us this year. I don't see it."