Second half outburst leads Aggies to 104-70 rout of Texas Southern
COLLEGE STATION — Texas Southern went into the locker room at halftime thinking they had a chance to beat Texas A&M. The combination of an Aggie offensive explosion and opportunistic defense made sure they didn’t.
After leading by only five points at intermission, the Aggies (2-0) exploded for 63 points in the second half to pummel the Tigers (0-2) 104-70 before 6,821 at Reed Arena Thursday night.
Five Aggies scored in double digits, led by forward Rashaun Agee‘s 16 points. A total of 12 different players scored for A&M, which has outscored the highest total for last year’s team in both of their first two outings under coach Bucky McMillan.
Slow start leads to slim halftime lead
Triple digits seemed a long way away with eight minutes gone in the game, when the Aggies trailed 23-17. Struggling from beyond the arc, the Aggies began to attack the basket with their big men, Agee and Federiko Federiko. Federiko’s first points, a dunk, cut Texas Southern’s lead to four, then Agee scored A&M’s next four points at close range. A 3-pointer by Pop Isaacs (6 points) cut the Tigers’ lead to one at 26-25, and two free throws from Federiko (9 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists) kept the Aggies close at 29-28. A free throw from Josh Holloway tied the game up, and a layup by Marcus Hill put A&M ahead 30-28.
Texas Southern took a one-point lead two more times, but a 6-0 run on a 3-pointer by Rylan Griffen (14 points) and three free throws from Ruben Dominguez (10 points) put the Aggies ahead to stay. Still, a 41-36 halftime lead was less than impressive.
What happened after halftime, however, was.
Aggies pummel Tigers with second half scoring avalanche
The Aggies started off the second half with a 3-pointer from Griffen and an 8-0 run that included a 3 from Agee and 5 points from Federiko in just 55 seconds to push the lead to 14 at 54-40. The run was aided by two of Texas Southern’s 23 turnovers, which led to 32 A&M points.
Another 12-0 run, which came courtesy of five more Tigers turnovers, put the Aggies up 22 at 66-42 with 13:41 remaining in the game. An 8-0 run that included 5 points from Ali Dibba (9 points) and a pair of TSU turnovers pushed the margin to 77-48 less than four minutes later.
Texas Southern would get no closer than 23 points from that point, but another big run of 10 points put the Aggies back up 33 with 3:40 remaining. Another four points from Dibba pushed A&M past the century mark at 101-68 with 1:11 to go.
For the half, the Aggies shot 60.6% from the field and 7 of 15 from 3-point distance (46.7%). They also made 17 of 21 free throws off of 12 Texas Southern fouls.
For the game, A&M shot 54% from the field and 38% (12-32) from beyond the arc. Texas Southern shot 51% from the field, but had 12 fewer shots than the Aggies. The Tigers went 15-25 from the free throw stripe, while the Aggies were 25-37.
A&M only turned the ball over 8 times and tallied 23 assists in the game.
