Old-fashioned all-around performance for the Pack
Offense? Great. Defense? Great. Everything was on point and clicking for Nevada tonight against one of the conference’s rougher teams in San Jose State, leading to an 87-54 win over the Spartans at Lawlor.
The threes were flying for the Pack and the defense held the team tight. All around, not much to complain about for the teams performance tonight.
Scoring Summary
1st Half
San Jose State 26 – Nevada 39
2nd Half
San Jose State 28 – Nevada 48
Final: San Jose State 54, Nevada 87
Offense
A missed shot on the opening drive for Nevada was quickly wiped by a three-pointer by Corey Camper Jr. for an early 3-0 lead. Camper followed up with two more early threes to start 3-3 from beyond the arc with nine points.
Nevada turned into a three-machine team through the first half. Averaging just 38.2 percent from beyond the arc this season, the Pack shot 57 percent from there in the first half alone. Camper led with three triples and finished the first half with 13 points.
“Any time you can make 12 threes, and they weren’t bad threes, we only shot 21, but I thought we made some good threes tonight,” Steve Alford said.
The aggressive offense led to a 14-3 run over three minutes of play. Nevada took a 39-25 lead into the final media timeout of the half with 2:35 to go. The Spartans also ended the final two and a half minutes of the first half on a scoring drought.
The second half featured similar aggression from deep, with Camper missing the first three taken, but Tayshawn Comer knocked down the next one for his first three of the night.
Nevada turned in a quick 8-0 run over about three minutes, making two out of four threes during that time. Give ‘em another 8-0 run, and Nevada went up by as much as 26 points with 10 minutes left.
Not much else had to be said about the offensive performance for the rest of the second half. Camper led in scoring with 19 points as three other Pack players (Comer 12, Payton White 12 and Kaleb Lowery 12) reached double-digits.
Nevada shot 29-57 (51 percent) from the field and 12-21 (57 percent) from three, one of its best performances from beyond the arc this season, and doubled its average three points made (6.8 threes per game).
Walk on Christopher Baudreau also made an appearance late in the game, scoring in the paint on a beautiful dunk over two defenders, sending the Nevada bench and crowd into a frenzy.
Defense
The Spartans opened up with two quick shots in the paint, but continued trailing through the first two media timeouts. San Jose State cut it to a three-point deficit at 15-11 at the 12:00 mark with 33 percent shooting from the field in that span.
San Jose State shot just 36 percent from the field and 25 percent from three in the first half. Nevada also forced five turnovers and nine personal fouls against the Spartans and went into halftime with a 13-point lead.
Spartan guard Jermaine Washington made back-to-back shots in the paint within the first two minutes, but those were the only points from the field made for San Jose State to start. The first media timeout of the second half struck with 14:33 to go, going 0-4 from the field and a scoring drought of 2:52 at that mark.
That streak broke just under 14 minutes with a layup by Melvin Bell Jr., making it a 57-36 game. The first six three-point attempts for SJSU were no good, and they finally made one with seven minutes left. The team shot 17 percent from that spot overall. The Spartans also shot just 30 percent from the field in the second half and 33 percent overall.
Nevada forced 19 total fouls and seven turnovers against San Jose State while winning the rebound battle 40-31.
What’s Next
Nevada will head back on the road for a one game roadtrip in Albuquerque to face New Mexico in The Pit.
It’ll be another high-end opponent for Nevada on the road as the two programs are neck and neck in the conference standings. Tip-off is scheduled for 5 p.m. PST on Saturday, Jan. 24.
Category: General Sports
