Memphis Wins Home-Opener vs San Francisco
Memphis defeated the San Francisco Dons 76-70 in their home-opener at FedExForum. This marks the Tiger’s 23rd straight home-opening win.
Memphis was led by guards Quante Berry and Sincere Parker. Berry led the team in scoring with 17 points and Parker scored 15 of his own alongside six rebounds.
After falling behind 1-0, the Tigers did not trail for the remainder of the game. Memphis led 10-3 early behind two 3-pointers from Ashton Hardaway, but by the 6:47 mark, the Dons cut the lead to 19-17.
It was around this point the Tigers started pressuring the Dons full court and created turnovers which resulted in a 17-5 run that put Memphis up 36-22 going into halftime.
By the 17 minute mark, Curtis Givens III scored his only basket of the game to give the Tigers a 23-point lead, the biggest of the game.
However, the Dons did not quit. Over the next seven minutes, San Francisco outscored Memphis 23-6 and cut the deficit to six. Then, Quante Berry had his own five-point run including a very timely shot from the perimeter to ignite the Forum.
Inside the 3 minute mark, the Tiger’s lead had fallen to just 4 before Berry hit another timely shot from beyond the arc that put Memphis up 69-62.
Once again, the Tigers ramped it up defensively to end the game and handed the Dons their first loss of the season. Memphis forced 16 turnovers and capitalized with 12 points off those takeaways.
Memphis finished shooting 26-66 (39.4%) from the field and 10-27 (37%) from the perimeter. Coach Penny Hardaway was pleased with his team’s 3-point shooting after their subpar start in the exhibition games.
“In the summertime, we shot the ball as well as any team I’ve ever had. I was like, we got like seven guys that can shoot the ball. And then the first two exhibitions, we didn’t shoot well so I figured that would come around.”
Hardaway was also donning the Bluey Air Jordan 1s to represent and show his support for everyone with Autism, including his son, Jayden.
It is clear that this is a team full of completely new players. So, they do struggle with chemistry and some communication, but players have already called players-only meetings and hang out with one another often off the court.
It seems it is only a matter of time before it clicks fully for this group and the offense and defense flow smoothly. For now, Hardaway is just proud of how his team competed.
“The thing I was most proud of, and I was proud of a lot, was they stayed together and encouraged each other for the entire game. So, I never felt like we were in jeopardy of losing.”
The Tigers will travel to Oxford to take on 2-0 Ole Miss on Tuesday at 8.p.m. In the last five matchups, Memphis is 3-2, the home team has won each time. Memphis will look to break that streak and continue to build on this win.
