Is it possible for the Memphis Tigers to win a basketball season-opener and the community mood to actually drop? It may have happened Saturday night.
The U of M basketball team handled old rival Southern Miss easily at FedExForum, cruising to a 67-49 win in front of the smallest crowd (announced attendance: 11,786) to see an opener since the arena debuted in 2004. The crowd was especially sparse due, in part, to the Top-25 football showdown between Memphis and Houston being played simultaneously in Texas. When the football team lost a heartbreaker in the final seconds — televised on the scoreboard after completion of the basketball game — those Tiger fans leaving FedExForum didn’t exactly display a victory strut.
Larry Kuzniewski
Dedric Lawson
For this night, though, the basketball team showed reason for optimism. Behind eight early points from heralded freshman Dedric Lawson, the Tigers stormed out to an 18-4 lead and never allowed the Golden Eagles to close the gap to single digits. Lawson finished with 13 points and a team-high five assists, while his younger brother, K.J., added seven points and five rebounds. Senior forward Shaq Goodwin scored 15 points (6 for 11 from the field) and pulled down nine rebounds, at least according to the official stat crew. “I’d like those rebounds to be recounted,” said a smiling Goodwin after the game. “I know I had more than nine.”
A pair of Tiger seniors expected to play key roles in the Memphis rotation did so in the runaway win. Making his Memphis debut after transferring from Alabama, point guard Ricky Tarrant set a rapid pace for the Tiger offense, leading to 29 fast-break points to exactly zero of the same for Southern Miss. “Ricky did what he was supposed to do tonight,” said Goodwin. “Set the tempo, found a lot of open guys. His shot wasn’t falling like it was in the exhibition game [Tarrant made one of six field-goal attempts], but he made an impact in other areas of the game.” And swingman Trahson Burrell came off the bench to score 11 points and grab five rebounds in 26 minutes.
The Tigers dished out 17 assists (on 23 made field goals) while committing only seven turnovers, a reversal of sorts from the early trend of a season ago. They scored 22 points off 19 Golden Eagle turnovers, pushing the ball in transition at the kind of pac
Larry Kuzniewski
Shaq Goodwin
e Memphis coach Josh Pastner insists his team will have to keep to compete with bigger opponents. Memphis held Southern Miss to 27-percent shooting while hitting 40 percent of their own shots. The shooting mark would have been considerably higher had the Tigers not missed 15 of 18 shots from three-point range.
After a turbulent offseason, Pastner sounded relieved to be talking basketball — players, numbers, trends, strategy — once again. “Whether good, bad, or indifferent, the only way for people to talk about basketball is for us to take the floor,” said the coach at the outset of his seventh season. “I really believe people are going to love this team. That doesn’t mean we’re going to win every game, but they’re going to leave it on the floor, they’re going to play the right way. They’re going to play with the fight Memphis wants to see. We have a lot of young guys. But I don’t think we’ll have any issues with body language, playing with passion. We will get better as each game moves forward.”
Senior guard Kedren Johnson did not play as he’s nursing a lingering injury to his right shoulder.
The Tigers return to action Tuesday when 8th-ranked Oklahoma visits FedExForum for an early (4 p.m.) tipoff.
