Aggies Defeat Ouachita Baptist - Head to New York City

A quick look back at Ouachita Baptist

On Saturday night the Aggies easily defeated Ouachita Baptist by a final score of 85-59.

The game was not nearly as close as the 26 point final margin indicated, and the best thing to come out of the game was that Mark Turgeon was able to play 18 different kids. It's always fun when the last 5 minutes of the game you keep asking yourself, "Who?"

All kidding aside it was good to see guys like Marshall Carrell, Chris Chapman, Shawn Schepel, Andrew Darko and Denzel Bowles get off the bench and get a few minutes late in the game.

Bryan Davis led all Aggies by scoring 15 points on a very efficient 6-of-9 from the field. Big #0 also added 6 boards, 3 offensive & 3 defensive.

However, the big story of the night was DeAndre Jordan, surprise-surprise.

Saturday, the 7'0" freshman continued to dazzle and set both a school and big 12 record in the process. Jordan finished the game with 12 points and 10 rebounds (the first double-double of his young career). Jordan had another perfect night from the field (his 3rd consecutive game without a miss) in going 6-for-6, and he set both a school and Big 12 record by making his 16th consecutive field goal without a miss. The old Big 12 record was held by Nebraska's Mikki Moore (13 straight). The last basket DeAndre missed was a jumper with 0:04 left in the first half of the Aggies' opening game against McNeese State back on the 9th of November.

DeAndre is now 20-for-22 (.909) on the year and very clearly leads both the Big 12 and the nation in the category of FG percentage.

We'll talk about DeAndre's struggles from the free-throw line (0-for-4) some other time.

The only other thing that stood out from Saturday was Josh Carter's ho-hum night.[<--- sarcasm] Josh threw in 3 of the 5 three-pointers that he put up. JC finished with 12 points and as usual, he made more than he missed.

A quick look ahead to Washington

OK - Let's take a quick look ahead to Wednesday night.The Aggies take on Lorenzo Romar's Washington Huskies at 6:00 CST in the semi-finals of the Dick's Sporting Goods NIT Season Tip-Off. The game will be televised nationally on ESPN2. The game against U-Dub will certainly be the best competition that A&M will have faced to date and should provide a very good measuring stick for the 2007-2008 Aggies.

The Huskies are led by 6'7" Junior forward Jon Brockman, who through three games this year is averaging 23 points and 11.7 rebounds per game. Brockman had a monster game in scoring 31 points and grabbing 18 rebounds in the Huskies' win over Utah that put them into the semi-final matchup with the Aggies. Brockman is listed on the pre-season Wooden Award watch list.

Joining Brockman in the Huskie frontcourt is 6'6" Quincy Pondexter.

My guess is that Turgeon will look early and often inside to Joe Jones (6'9") and DeAndre Jordan (7'0") to take advantage of the severe size mismatch in favor of the Aggies. That being said, I will be curious to see how Jones and Jordan handle the speed and quickness of the smaller Brockman and Pondexter when the Aggies are back on defense.

Usually "smaller" translates into "quicker" and this is certainly the case with the Huskies. I suspect that you will see Turgeon operate a revolving door off the bench and use the athletes he has at his disposal to keep fresh legs coming at the Huskies. The Huskies start a three-guard, two-forward rotation but Coach Romar has 9 guys that are averaging double-digit minutes this season.

The other DSGNITSTO semi-final features Ohio State vs. Syracuse with the two winners meeting in the championship game on Friday while the two semi-final losers will meet in the consolation game.

I hope you guys all have a great Thanksgiving and enjoy spending time with your friends and family.

We'll have a quick look back at Wednesday's game and also take a quick peek at their match-up with either Syracuse or Ohio State on Friday.

Links

Aggie men's basketball team beats Ouachita Baptist
http://www.aggiesports.com/mbasketball/Aggie_
men_s_basketball_team_beats_Ouachita_Baptist

Davis, Jordan carry No. 15 A&M to rout
http://www.star-telegram.com/504/story/308417.html

Freshman breaks Big 12 record in A&M victory
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws
/spt/colleges/texasam/stories/111807dnspoaghoops.2952742.html

Turgeon signs pair of Florida prep standouts
http://www.aggieathletics.com/pressRelease.php?
PRID=13613


Carry on.
-sb