MONROE, La. – All five starters scored in double-figures for the ULM men's basketball program as the Warhawks remained undefeated at home with a lopsided 100-68 victory over South Alabama on Saturday at Fant-Ewing Coliseum.
ULM (8-11, 4-4 SBC) improved to 7-0 at home this season and 4-0 in conference play. The Warhawks shot 32-61 (.525) from the field and made a season-high 28 free throws on 34 attempts.
Senior Justin Roberson netted a game-high 23 points on 9-12 shooting as he scored at least 20 points for the third straight contest. Senior DeMondre Harvey posted a career-high 20 points and went 10-11 from the free throw line. Senior Majok Deng finished with 17 points and went 9-10 from the charity stripe.
Senior Jamaal Samuel registered his first career double-double with 14 points and a career-high 13 rebounds. Junior Nick Coppola tallied 13 points and buried a trio of three-pointers. Both Coppola and Roberson dished out seven assists. Roberson played 40 minutes for the second straight game.
USA (7-12, 2-6) was guided by Ken Williams who scored 14 points. Georgi Boyanov put in 13 points on 5-7 shooting.
ULM led 15-14 in the first half when Roberson converted a four-point play with a three-pointer, foul and free throw to go up 19-14 at the 11:32 mark. Still ahead 23-21, freshman Travis Munnings scored a put-back, Samuel hit a jumper and Harvey completed an old-fashion three-point play to extend the lead to 30-21 with 4:46 left.
After USA scored the next two points, the Warhawks used a 9-0 run, capped by a three-pointer by Coppola, to push their lead up to 39-23 with 1:32 remaining. The Jags scored the final six points to make it a 39-29 game at the break.
The Warhawks were up 54-44 in the second half when a dunk by Samuel started a 7-0 spurt to extend the advantage up to 61-44 at the 13:07 mark. A pair of free throws by Coppola made it a 71-51 with 9:42 remaining.
ULM led 85-62 when it poured it on with a 6-0 run which included a tip-in by senior Mack Foster to make it 91-62 at the 2:43 mark. The Warhawks reached 100 points with 27 seconds left when a lay-up by Munnings increased the lead to 100-67.
Up next, the Warhawks will remain at home next weekend beginning on Thursday when they host UT Arlington at 7:00 p.m. at Fant-Ewing Coliseum.
NOTES
- ULM scored 100 points in a conference game for the first time since Jan. 4, 2014 when it defeated UL-Lafayette, 103-98 in double overtime. The last time the Warhawks scored 100 points in regulation in a league-game was on Feb. 18, 1995 in a 108-83 victory over Sam Houston State in a Southland Conference affair
- The Warhawks improved to 77-4 all-time when scoring at least 100 points. It was their second 100-point game this season as they defeated Central Baptist, 101-76
- ULM scored at least 85 points in back-to-back conference games for the first time since January, 2007 when it beat Troy 91-78 and then lost 103-96 at WKU. The Warhawks defeated Troy 85-74 on Thursday
- The 32-point win was ULM's largest margin of victory over an SBC opponent since Feb. 22, 2007 when it thumped Denver, 87-51 at home
- The Warhawks improved to 7-0 (4-0 SBC) at home this season and 21-4 (.840) at home over the last two years. ULM is now 411-173 all-time in Fant-Ewing Coliseum
- ULM notched its sixth consecutive victory over South Alabama and tied the all-time series, 10-10
- The Warhawks have held SBC opponents to under 75 points in 36 straight games including postseason play
- ULM entered the game ranking top-three in the conference in rebounding margin (+3.6) and held a big 39-26 edge over the Jaguars
- The Warhawks improved to 2-0 with the starting lineup of Coppola, Roberson, Deng, Samuel and Harvey
- Roberson has averaged 23 points per game over the last three games after averaging 10.3 points through the first 16 games this season. He has reached double-figures in scoring in nine of the last 10 games. He entered the game shooting .439 from beyond-the-arc and went 2-4 (.500) in the game. It was his 27th career double-figure scoring game and 12th this season. His seven assists marked a season-high
- Harvey's career-high 20 points beat out his previous best of 19 against Canisius this season in a triple-overtime game. His 10 made free throws was a career-high. Harvey recorded his ninth career double-figure scoring game and fifth this year. Harvey entered the game shooting .532 from the field and went 5-7 (.714) in the contest
- Deng submitted his 39th career double-figure scoring game and 14th this year. He's scored at least 14 points in 11 of his last 12 outings. Deng entered the game ranking third in the league in blocks (1.3 bpg) and swatted a pair. He ranks seventh all-time in career blocks at ULM with 73 and needs 16 more to catch Rudy Turner
- Samuel became the fifth different Warhawk to post a double-double this season along with Deng, Harvey, Munnings and Coppola. It was his 18th career double-figure scoring game and 10th this year. It was also his second career double-digit rebounding performance and first this season
- Coppola moved up to No. 7 all-time in ULM history in career minutes with 2,958. He needs to log six more minutes to catch Michael Saulsberry in sixth, and 26 more minutes to pass Paul Marshall in fifth. Coppola is already the school leader in minutes per game with 35.2 in his career. Coppola also moved up to No. 7 all-time in career starts with 84. He's started every game in his career. In the assist category, Coppola ranks seventh all-time with 320 and needs four more to catch Casey Jones who dished out 324. Coppola scored in double-figures for the 38th time in his career and 10th time this year
- Munnings entered the game ranking second in the league in field goal percentage (.543) and upped it by going 3-4 (.750) in the contest
- The Warhawks are the second-winningest program over the last two seasons in terms of Sun Belt Conference victories
Quoting ULM head coach Keith Richard
Opening Statement
“We played great offensively. We really did. That's two games in a row. We've played great offensively at home all year. It's like we have two different teams: the one at home and the one on the road. This was a really good offensive performance with five guys in double-figures. We played well offensively in the first half and even better in the second. It was certainly nice to see.”
On Justin Roberson's last two games
“Well he played well at Georgia Southern too and was really our only guy who played well offensively that game. So that's three in a row for him. Justin is looking like the player that we recruited and hoped he could one day be. As we see, it certainly makes a difference with our team, no question.”
On Jamaal Samuel
“Jamaal turned it over one time, and usually I get on him about turnovers, but I told him that I wasn't going to say anything because he's doing an unbelievable job rebounding. His length was bothering them out there. Our length in general was bothering them. I kept telling Jamaal, go get some more rebounds, keep getting them.”
On DeMondre Harvey
“I told DeMondre at halftime, in front of our team, that there's no reason he shouldn't have 20 points in this game. It was there for him. The middle was open in the zone and we needed to feed it there and play off of it. We needed an aggressive guy to go make plays at the rim and he did that.”
On Mack Foster
“He didn't get as many minutes tonight because of how the game went, but these two games we needed a guard to come off the bench and be a solid player. We didn't need great plays. We just needed to not turn the ball over, play great defense, shoot lay-ups, get the ball to the open guy, etc. That's really what we needed from a guard off the bench. Mack is a senior, I know he wants to play, I want him to play, but I want him to play the way we need him to play. I thought he did that the last two games.”
On ULM's next game against UT Arlington on Thursday
“A lot of people are saying that UT Arlington is the best team in the league. I'm hearing that a lot, over and over. What a great opportunity for us to play that game right here in Monroe."
Quoting senior Justin Roberson
On whether Thursday's performance carried over
“Yes sir. I was just trying to get the team into it. Let's just play ball and be happy about it. I was trying to be a team player and get my teammates going as well. Once they started scoring you could tell we were hitting on all cylinders.”
On how important next weekend will be
“Yeah we're trying to get those two and climb back over .500. We don't want a down year. We're aiming for the top. We want the ring. I just think we need to stay focused at the task at hand and keep playing ball.”
Quoting senior Jamaal Samuel
On the team's mentality coming in
“We just had to be focused. We gave away some games on the road and so we felt we had to dig ourselves out of this hole coming into this four-game home stretch.”
On how they were able to be so successful against the zone
“Coach Richard was trying to get us to get it to certain parts of the zone. We wanted to play out of it and make plays.”
On his double-double
“I just wanted to rebound more. I knew I was playing against a smaller guy so I knew I had to get as many rebounds as possible. I was just trying to do my part.”
