The IUS men’s basketball team won their fourth-consecutive Kentucky Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Tournament on Feb. 26, defeating IU East with a score of 91-85.
The game started with a hot-shooting IU East team taking an early 12-point lead as the Grenadiers failed to score until more than three minutes were gone from the game.
IU Southeast fought back and took a 5-point lead at 56-51 to the halftime break.
Both teams had late second-half leads.
IU East reclaimed the lead by 1 point, 83-82, with 2:11 left to play as Marcus Isaac, sophomore guard, made a basket and free throw.
Jazzmarr Ferguson, senior guard, took the lead back for IU Southeast with a made 3-pointer on the next possession, and IU Southeast would never trail again.
With his 31-point performance in the game, Ferguson became the first IUS player to break the 2,000-point mark, bringing his total scoring to 2,014 points.
Good defense down the stretch by Rick Bodiford, senior guard, and Reginald Breeden, freshman guard, helped seal the game for the Grenadiers.
Bodiford said it was a great challenge guarding the pump fake of IU East’s Tyler Rigby, senior guard.
“Rigby is a good player,” Bodiford said. “He shoots so well that you have to respect it, and, finally, I understood that that’s what he was trying to do after the three or four times I messed that up, but after I figured it out, I had him.”
IUS head coach Wiley Brown spoke highly of both Rigby and David Sanders, junior point guard.
“Rigby is still going to get his points,” Brown said. “We know that Sanders is really good. He’s a good player off the dribble.”
Breeden was matched up against Sanders for most of the game and said Brown’s challenge was what helped him hold Sanders to 20 points.
“Coach challenged me,” Breeden said. “Last game, he had 32 points, so coach told me to come out here and lock up.”
Brown talked about the leadership and how players other than Ferguson stepped up and were key to the victory.
“It’s got to be Bodiford [and Darryl Bell, junior guard,] who stepped up,” Brown said. “We’ve got to have other guys like that step up, and that’s what happened. We had four guys in double figures. That’s how we defeated them.”
The four players scoring in double figures for the Grenadiers were Ferguson with 31 points and 5 assists, Bodiford with 21 points and 14 rebounds, Bell with 17 points and Breeden with 11 points.
IU East had four scorers of their own in double figures. Tyler Rigby, IUE senior guard, had a team-high of 30 points while David Sanders, IUE junior point guard, had 20 points, Isaac had 12 points and Brenton Burris, IUE senior point guard, had 10 points for the Red Wolves.
Both teams will be in the national tournament this year, and IUE head coach Mark Hester said both teams have about the same chance to win it all.
“We’re two pretty evenly-matched teams,” Hester said of IU East and IU Southeast.
Brown said the Grenadiers have a good chance to be a tough out for teams at the national tournament because of their up-tempo style.
“Our style usually affects a lot of the other teams,” Brown said. “They’re not used to playing as fast as we are.”
Ferguson said this IUS team is possibly the best in school history.
“This team has the biggest upside that any team has ever had at IUS,” Ferguson said. “I fully believe that I played on three of the best teams to ever play here, and the reason I say that — not taking away from the team we had the previous three years — but we have four big men that truly can play and help us out at the national tournament.”
IU Southeast kicks off first-round tournament action on Thursday, March 10, at 9:30 a.m. against 14th-seeded Iowa Wesleyan College.
All tournament games can be watched online at naia.cstv.com for a flat fee of $9.95 for the entire tournament.
By BRENT KULWICKI
Staff
bkulwick@ius.edu
