CHENEY, Wash. – The Southern Utah University men's basketball team tipped off its Big Sky Conference campaign Thursday night with a decisive 89-76 win over last season's conference champion Eastern Washington University.
With the win, SUU improves to 4-3 overall and 1-0 in the Big Sky Conference, while Eastern Washington dropped to 3-4 on the year and 0-1 in conference play.
"I am proud of our guys' execution of the game plan," said SUU Head coach Todd Simon. "Eastern Washington is a tough team especially on their home floor, and to lead wire-to-wire is a testament to the guys' effort and focus. Keys to the win were our rebounding and finishing in the paint."
Redshirt senior guard Dre Marin led the Thunderbirds offensively with a career-high 28 points while shooting 5-of-10 from downtown. He also racked up four assists and three rebounds on the night. John Knight lll continued to be a hot hand for the Thunderbirds racking up 22 points with seven rebounds and nine assists. Center Jason Spurgin was also a force down low scoring a career-high 13 points with eight rebounds.
As a team, the Thunderbirds shot lights out and set a new season-best in field goal percentage at 55.1 percent while holding the Eagles to 44.2 percent from the floor. They also controlled the paint earning 42 points compared to Eastern Washington's 20.
SUU led the majority of the game and got things going right out of the gate. The Thunderbirds jumped out to an early 11-4 lead after three consecutive Spurgin buckets. They continued to sustain their lead as Marin started to find his rhythm scoring 11 first-half points and sending the T-Birds into the half with a 44-31 lead.
Coming out of the break, the T-Birds continued to surge forward and scored three long-range jumpers to extend their lead to 17 points in the first two minutes of the second half. Finding themselves down, the Eagles kept fighting and responded by going on an 11-0 run narrowing their deficit to just six points, forcing SUU into a timeout.
Both teams continued to battle out of the timeout, but the Thunderbirds were too strong and took back all of the momentum. They increased their lead back out to double digits after Marin scored eight quick points and kept piling on, putting the game out of Eastern's reach.
The T-Birds will now travel to Idaho to take on the University of Idaho on Saturday, December 4th. Tip-off is scheduled for 3 p.m. MT. Streaming for the event will be available on ESPN+.
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