Flames Burn ECU 77-57 To Remain Undefeated
Caleb Homesley scored 25 points to lead undefeated Liberty to a convincing twenty-point 77-57 victory over ECU Saturday night in Minges Coliseum.
Homesley scored 15 of his points in the second half against an ECU team that hit just 38.5 percent from the floor and only 12 of 22 from the foul line in their third loss in four tries to begin the season.
ECU did get a solid performance from Jayden Gardner who tossed in a game high 26 points, but most of his damage came late in the contest after scoring just eight points in the first twenty minutes.
Liberty presented a myriad of offensive and defensive problems for the Pirates who are struggling to find a way to win with two of their best guards out with injuries to go along with a pair of post players out in the form of Ludgy Debaut and Seth LeDay who looked fine in warmups but ECU head coach Joe Dooley said he wasn’t moving well earlier in the the shoot around so he limited his minutes. That made a limited ECU lineup even more limited.
“They’re really good shooters. Unfortunately we weren’t able to run them off the line especially in the second half. They just ran their offense to perfection tonight,” said Gardner afterward, “They were trapping the post and I just had to get it out of there. The second half I just focused on not posting up as much and driving to the basket because then they can’t trap me if I’m driving to the basket. I also tried to set up my teammates on the wing, but they were not able to hit shots tonight.”
The Flames’ offense yielded a boat load of quality scoring opportunities and also isolated their post players where they did a lot of offensive damage in the lane.
“It was difficult because of the way they were cutting and moving,” 6-6 freshman guard Brandon Suggs said, "I felt like in the first half we were sticking with them, but in the second half we just gave out of energy."
After the game, ECU head coach Joe Dooley said his team shouldn’t get tired at their age and that the biggest lesson learned is how much progress his team will need to make before heading into conference play if they want to be competitive.
“We’ve got a long way to go defensively and we’ve got a long way to go toughness wise and that’s the biggest thing to me,” Dooley told PirateIllustrated.com, “We do play east-west too much. We’ve talked about that a lot. You make your free throws and you don’t get out rebounded. Those are toughness plays to me and it shows how far we have to go.”
Dooley said he did not like the way the game played out, especially in the second half.
“They imposed their will from the beginning of the second half until the end,” said Dooley, “I’m disappointed in our lack of ability to bounce back. We gave up so many easy shots and they made them. They made layups and we missed layups. I thought they just completely dominated the second half and we had no answer. It was just very embarrassing. It was an absolute debacle.”
Liberty jumped out to as much as an 18-9 lead early in the game on a pair of Georgie Pacheco-Ortiz baskets before the Pirates closed to within one at 21-20 on three straight ECU scores with 6:35 to go in the first period.
The Flames then converted on four trips late in the half and found themselves up 32-26 at the break.
Eight points from Jayden Gardner and seven points from Brandon Suggs led ECU while Caleb Homesley’s ten first half points led Liberty(4-0) after twenty minutes of play.
But six straight Scottie James points and a Darius McGhee trey allowed Liberty to quickly open up a 41-28 lead less than three minutes into the second half.
The lead then grew to as much as twenty-one on a Shiloh Robinson bucket at the 7:40 mark and remained at twenty with five minutes to go. Liberty cruised the rest of the way to remain undefeated on the season.
ECU hits the road next to take on a tough and undefeated Evansville team next Friday night. Last Tuesday, Evansville picked up a three-point win over top ranked Kentucky. Game time is set for 8 o’clock in the Islands of the Bahamas Showcase.
PI AUDIO: JOE DOOLEY POST GAME COMMENTS
