The Memphis Tigers (7-5, 3-2) finally returned to FedExForum Thursday night to host the Wichita State Shockers (8-4, 4-2) in their first home action since their win over South Florida back in December.
Points were scarce in the opening minutes. Each side traded ill-advised shots and turnovers, with neither eclipsing 35% shooting for the period. The difference came at the three-point line, where the Tigers knocked down six of their first nine tries while the Shockers missed their first twelve. Despite coughing the ball up ten times in the first twenty minutes, Penny Hardaway’s group still carried a 25-19 lead into the intermission.
Whatever message Hardaway gave during the break seemed to resonate. The Tiger offense exploded to start the second, growing its lead to as much as sixteen. While the Shockers flirted with making the score interesting again, trimming the deficit to nine, they were ultimately too bogged down by their own struggles on the offensive end and Memphis cruised to a much-needed 72-52 victory.
“Total team win,” Hardaway said. “We looked like a basketball team tonight, for forty minutes. I’m proud of everything that we did. I don’t want to say anything negative about tonight because we scored the most points of the season. We had 22 assists, we out-rebounded them by 8 and we shot the ball well from the three-point line and free-throw line, so I’m happy.”
The Tigers’ eleven made triples set a new season high. Four players finished with double figures, including Landers Nolley pacing all scorers with a game-high 16 points. For an offense that has endured far too many putrid stretches at times this season, Thursday night’s result was an encouraging sign that there may be light at the end of the tunnel.
“It's been a long time coming,” Hardaway said. “You’ve got to understand, we’ve been doing this forever. The boys got a chance to see the fruit of their labor. They’ve been working so hard in practice to able to get to this point and tonight was great.”
The real story of the second half, however, was the play of first-year center Moussa Cisse. Despite struggling on that end of the floor thus far this season, Cisse dominantly reminded everyone why he was so highly touted as a high-school prospect a year ago. The freshman scored all twelve of his points in the second half and threw down several ferocious dunks in rapid succession as the Tigers turned in what is likely their finest half of play of the entire season.
“It felt good,” Cisse said. “The past few games, I’ve been struggling. Finally, I found the touches. I’ve been working hard, and it’s starting to show.”
After seeing several games postponed in recent weeks, the Tigers will now gear up for a pivotal portion of their schedule where they will play five conference games in eleven days. Despite their early-season flounders, the team that showed up Thursday night has a legitimate chance to make some noise in the American Athletic Conference if they can replicate that type of performance on a consistent basis.
First up for Memphis will be a road date at East Carolina this Sunday. Tip-off in Greenville is set for 2p.m.
