Dain Dainja slipped to the hoop early in the game, and PJ Haggerty bounced the ball to him for what was a thunderous slam over AAC Preseason Player of the Year Yaxel Lendeborg. Dainja swung from the hoop, holding on for perhaps a second or two too long, right into the face of Lendeborg.
That was a sign of things to come as the Tigers, donning the Memphis State throwbacks, blasted UAB 100-77, asserting themselves as the clear best team in the conference after UAB was picked to win the league in the preseason.
In their most efficient offensive performance of the season, the Tigers shot a scorching 62.3% from the field and 52.9% from deep for 1.31 points per possession. Five Tigers scored in double figures, led by Dain Dainja’s 21 points and 8 rebounds and PJ Haggerty’s 23 points, 9 assists, and 6 rebounds.
“We couldn’t guard them, I don’t have illusions of grandeur up here,” said UAB head coach Andy Kennedy after the game. “Complete domination, inside, outside, offense, defense.”
The domination began from the jump today, largely due to the new starting lineup. For the first time since Nov. 18 against Ohio, Penny Hardaway changed the starting lineup, favoring Dain Dainja instead of Moussa Cisse as the starting center. The change was a rousing success, as Dainja played his best game in a Tiger uniform and completely controlled the game. The lineup was incredibly succesulf at the start of halves too, opening the first half on an 11-4 run and the second half on a 12-6 run.
“I thought about it right before Ole Miss, because I felt we were getting off to rocky starts… and then decided ok I’m gonna do it now… and exactly what I thought would happen happened, (Dainja) went out there and dominated,” Hardaway said after the game.
Dainja came out as energized as he has been all season, with the aforementioned dunk on Lendeborg. He then metaphorically did what he did to Lendeborg to the whole UAB team to in a dominant 2:43 stretch after the under eight media timeout in first half, where Dainja carved up the Blazer’s interior defense for 10 straight points. He was just one point of a career high in points.
Apart from Dainja, Nicholas Jourdain and Moussa Cisse chipped in today for the most complete frontcourt performance of the season. Jourdain had his best game of conference play, where he has struggled, stuffing the box score with 10 points, 7 rebounds, 4 assists, and 2 blocks. Cisse responded well to coming off the bench, adding 9 points, 8 boards, 2 blocks and a steal.
In the Temple loss, characterized by the horrible rebounding performance, the three big men combined for just 11 rebounds, while today, against the best rebounding team in the AAC, they had 23 as a unit. In addition, Memphis dominated paint scoring due to the bigs, outscoring UAB 54-30 in the paint, and outrebounded the best rebounding team in the conference 37 to 33.
Additionally, after having a putrid 6 to 20 assist to turnover ratio on Thursday’s disappoint win over Wichita St., Memphis responded with a 24 to 13 assist the turnover ratio, tallying the most assists they have had all year. Apart from a sloppy final 10 minutes when the game was already in hand, Memphis took the best care of the ball they have yet, only having four turnovers in the first 30 minutes of the game.
“Most of our turnovers are coming from trying to do too much,” said Hardaway. “We made the right decisions… we went from a good shot to a great shot all day.”
The exclamation mark on the affair came in the final seconds. With just a one second differential between the shot clock and game clock, and the Tigers leading 97-77, PJ Carter, who contributed a season best 14 points, had the ball.
“We was talking about it before the game. (Carter) was like, ‘I need my ISO,’” said Haggerty. “We got the ball in his hands, we had 97, it was the time for the ISO.”
Carter, on his ISO, drilled a three pointer to get the score to 100, and the striped-out crowd and bench erupted.
After today's statement, Memphis sits atop the AAC standings with North Texas, who they own the tiebreaker over.
“Here’s where we show separation from the best in the league,” said Hardaway about the mindset coming into today. “We want to send a message to all the top teams.” They did exactly that.
