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SMU men's basketball team shocked by 1-9 Jackson State in inaugural Dallas Classic

http://www.dallasnews.com/sports/colleg ... lassic.ece


SMU forward Leslee Smith drives on Jackson State's Willie Readus in the first half. The game at DISD's Ellis Davis Fieldhouse attracted a crowd announced at 1,925.
By KATE HAIROPOULOS

Staff Writer

[email protected]

Published: 15 December 2011 10:12 PM

SMU, in the inaugural Dallas Classic, played Thursday night at Dallas ISD's Ellis Davis Fieldhouse, didn't make the impression it was going for.

The Mustangs fell, 59-58, to Jackson State, which had won one of its first 10 games before facing SMU (5-4). Freshman Kelsey Howard led Jackson State with 27 points on 9-of-14 shooting. The Tigers (2-9), down 10 early in the second half, used hot shooting to take its first lead with 7:19 left on a 3-pointer by Howard, then squeezed out the win late.

"Probably so," SMU coach Matt Doherty said when asked if the program had missed an opportunity by losing in the Classic, which was part of the program's ongoing efforts to fix a disconnect between SMU and DISD and the greater Dallas area. "But just the attention of coming here, I know they appreciate it."

SMU, down one, had the ball, but point guard Jeremiah Samarrippas turned the ball over with 24 seconds left.

Jackson State hit two free throws to expand its lead to three. SMU got off two decent looks to tie the score, but Robert Nyakundi and Samarrippas' shots were off.

The Tigers added another free throw with four seconds left and Nyakundi hit a 3-pointer as time expired, but by then it was meaningless.

Jackson State shot 53.8 percent in the second half, 55.6 percent from 3-point range.

"Our defense was not very good, granted, they got hot," Doherty said. "I didn't like the way we guarded."

Nyakundi led SMU with 15 points and Cotton Giles, a Kimball product, had 13. Shawn Williams, the Texas transfer and Duncanville alum making his SMU debut, scored 12 and made an impact. SMU, which went 5-of-13 from the foul line, was playing its first game since Dec. 4, after taking a break for finals.

Before the game, Kris Lowe, an SMU's associate athletic director, said SMU was pleased with the community's reaction to playing the game in South Dallas, not just talking about wanting to be Dallas' team.

SMU offered $5 general admission tickets and flooded the arena with free T-shirts. An announced crowd of 1,925 attended at the 7,500-seat arena.

The court exeplified what SMU desired partnership with DISD - with a stick-on SMU logo at midcourt, joining the Dallas ISD spelled out on the sidelines.

Several SMU players played at Ellis Davis during their high school careers and are from the area.

The local double header on ESPNU HS game with Marcus probably didnt help

DMN photo slideshow if you are curious -

http://www.dallasnews.com/sports/colleg ... -squad.ece

Maybe if we played a better team more people would have showed up....oh wait...

HS players and BB fans don't want to watch the Princeton offense. They would rather, and so would I, watch the Loyola Marymount run and gun.

princeton is a great system, but when you have athletes, you need to break, exploit numbers when you have them, and mix-in motion looks for zones. Heck, when you have superior length & athletes, wreak havoc and press a little. There is nothing wrong w/the princeton, it's our execution of the princeton. I understand the methodology behind the system, and it's all very sound, but even Carrill evolved it. When you have mixed personnel, you have to have other looks that match their skill sets.

hoopmanx wrote:princeton is a great system, but when you have athletes, you need to break, exploit numbers when you have them, and mix-in motion looks for zones. Heck, when you have superior length & athletes, wreak havoc and press a little. There is nothing wrong w/the princeton, it's our execution of the princeton. I understand the methodology behind the system, and it's all very sound, but even Carrill evolved it. When you have mixed personnel, you have to have other looks that match their skill sets.

why can't you run a couple of different looks depending on the team you are playing? this grind it out in the 50's ain't gonna work anymore.

Travis Bickle wrote:My family including my sons and their friends had a wonderful experience at the Southern Methodist University and Jackson State University basketball game. They were "close" to the action and the price of admission was very reasonable. Thus we hope the Ponies will do this again next season.

It is not like Jackson State is horrible. Their record was 1-9 going into the game but lots of teams would be playing at Baylor, Wright State, Ohio State, Tulsa, North Florida, Memphis, California, and St. Mary's. They got us! Plain and simple.

Move on to the next game and learn from this and get mentally and physically tougher and let's go forward. You have to win everytime at home and "steal" some on the road. Coach Doherty, we appreciate you holding your players accountable for their actions and in your tenure can't remember any real major problems with your team, assistant coaches, or NCAA violations which I seem to read in the newspaper everyday about some program. Thank you!

good insight. Keep posting.

I have always thought Coach Doh was a great ambassador for SMU, something I can't say about our FB coach.

He deserves this season to see if he can turn things around, but at some point has got to show some production, i.e. a winning record in C-USA.

If he is replaced, one season before BE would seem ideal, but for the record, I am rooting for Doh.

SoCal_Pony wrote:I have always thought Coach Doh was a great ambassador for SMU, something I can't say about our FB coach.

Absolutely. No one has ever questioned his devotion to SMU.

Of course he's devoted to SMU.....where can he go......who would be dumb enough to hire him?

You must have thought that was a really important post.

Good points

angryfan04 wrote:Of course he's devoted to SMU.....where can he go......who would be dumb enough to hire him?

are you talking about Doh or JJ?

He's talking about Doherty

By Maryland situation, do you mean inventing a job offer and having your camp leak it 48 hours before the bowl game? Yeah, I'd bet that had a little bit of an effect when we sh*t the bed against Army only scoring 14 points. It still baffles me that we played that poorly and had such a pathetic offensive attack against a much less talented team.