South Alabama Sports Weekend Roundup
Men’s Basketball
The Men’s basketball team saw their 34-27 halftime lead over Louisiana-Monroe be overtaken in route to the Warhawks 64-58 win on Saturday night at the Mitchell Center.
The Warhark defense held the Jags to 22.2% shooting from the floor in the second half and a mere 9.1% from 3-point range. The Jags only shot 32.2% for the game.
ULM shot 48% in the second half as Tylor Ongwae and Nick Collola combined for 24 points in the second half. Ongwae ended the game with a career high 19 points, 14 of them in the second half.
ULM began the second half by scoring the first seven points to tie the Jaguars at 34-all. They then used an 11-3 run midway through the second half to take their largest lead of the game at 47-43.
The Jags countered with a 6-0 run, with the last four coming from the foul line, as the Jags cut the Warhawk lead to one point, 52-51. But ULM answered with an 8-2 run to take a 60-53 lead with 2:18 left in the game.
Antoine Allen gave the Jags some life by hitting a 3-pointer with less than a minute remaining, but USA then missed their last three shots of the game.
Augustine Rubit had team highs of 18 points and 12 rebounds for his eighth double-double of the season and 50th of his career which is second in school history behind Terry Catledge’s 52 and leads all active Division I players. Aakim Saintil added 11 points, his third consecutive game in double-digits. Mychal Ammons added eight points and 12 rebounds.
Dionte Ferguson scored all seven of his points from the foul line and tied his season high with six rebounds.
“Unfortunately, offensively, we didn’t do a good job of attacking,” head coach Matthew Graves said. “We settled for a lot of 3-point shots when we had an advantage on getting the ball inside to Augustine (Rubit) and Mychal (Ammons). Our guards continued to shoot shots and you try to sub guys in and out and they keep doing the same thing. It’s very frustrating that we’re not learning from some of the mistakes that we’ve made in previous games.”
South Alabama drops to 7-12 overall and 1-5 in Sun Belt play. ULM improves to 6-7 overall and 3-2 in conference play. The Jags will travel to UT-Arlington on Saturday, January 25th for a 7:30pm tipoff.
Women’s Basketball
The Lady Jaguars picked up their third conference win of the season as Rachel Cumbo connected on all four of her foul shots in the final 18.3 seconds to seal the win over ULM 72-70 on Saturday afternoon at the Mitchell Center.
Cumbo led all scorers with 19 points and made all eight of her free-throw attempts, went 4-of-6 from the field and 3-of-4 from outside the 3-point arc.
Ronneka Robertson earned her first double-double of the seaons with 12 points and 11 rebounds while also going a perfect 6-of-6 from the foul line.
Meghan Dunn finished with 14 points on 5-of-10 shooting. Breanna Hall added another double-digit performance off of the bench with 10 points.
The Lady Jaguars improve to 5-11 overall and 3-3 in Conference play. They will travel to UT-Arlington on Saturday, January 25th for a 5pm tipoff.
Football
As the Jaguar staff are on the road recruiting, they will be getting ready for a big push this weekend as they will have a big group of players visiting over the weekend just in time for the Senior Bowl.
But there were some media reports about head coach Joey Jones being a potential ‘dark horse’ candidate for UAB’s head coaching position. The position became vacant when Garrick McGee left the program after two seasons to return to being an offensive coordinator under Bobby Petrino at his new head coaching position at Louisville.
Though many close to the program never though that Jones was ever considering the position. He was contacted, probably for the school to find out about former South Alabama defensive coordinator Bill Clark, who interviewed for the position. Clark left Mobile after the 2012 season to take the head coaching position at Jacksonville State.
Reports are swirling that Clark may be named the head coach at UAB but other names being linked to the position are former Wake Forest head coach Jim Grobe and former Clemson head coach Tommy Bowden.
In an interview with AL.com, coach Jones said, “I’m staying at South Alabama. I’m not going anywhere.” Jones coached high school and college football in Birmingham and played for the University of Alabama and the Birmingham Stallions during his football career, but has been at South Alabama for the last five seasons as he was hired to start the program at South Alabama.
As South Alabama continues to improve and make waves in the Sun Belt and the college football landscape, these reports will increase. So, Jaguar fans, don’t be caught by surprise when his name is linked to more open coaching positions in the future. The best advice comes from a British saying, “Keep Calm and Carry On.”