Kareem Brewer scored 22, Mike Parks had 20 and Kyvon Davenport added 17 as Memphis(19-12/10-8 AAC) handled ECU by twenty, 90-70 on senior day in the FedEx Forum Sunday afternoon.
Shawn Williams scored 17 and Isaac Fleming tossed in 16 in a losing effort for the Pirates who fall to 10-19 on the season and 4-14 in AAC play.
The Pirates jumped out to an early 13-8 lead behind seven early Aaron Jackson points. Then B.J. Tyson’s three-point jumper and a layup from Isaac Fleming had the Pirates up by two at the midway point of the first half.
The two teams exchanged baskets over the next three minutes before Memphis went on a 14-3 run on 52 percent shooting from the floor and 85 percent from the stripe to take a nine point 38-28 lead with 3:05 to go in the half. Jumpers from Mike Parks and Kareem Brewton, Jr. and five Tiger free throws keyed the run.
Brewton’s 15 first half points had the Tigers up by fifteen points at halftime at 45-30. Eleven from Shawn Williams and nine B.J. Tyson points led ECU at the break.
The Pirates went cold going as long as five minutes without scoring in the second half. Meanwhile the Tigers further jumped on ECU offensively taking a 70-40 lead before a K.J. Davis trey ended the run.
Memphis outscored ECU 48-24 in the paint in the first 34 minutes of the contest before the Pirates cut the lead to twenty at 80-60 with 4:19 to play on a dunk from Jabari Craig.
The Tigers hit 53 percent of their shots from the floor to go along with 17 free throws in the victory while ECU hit 47 percent from the floor and 64 percent from the foul line in their nineteenth loss of the regular season.
