Nov. 10, 2007

Final Stats

Daytona Beach, Fla. - Bethune-Cookman University was picked to finish sixth in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, but that didn't help the Wildcats in their season-opener Saturday night at Moore Gymnasium.

NAIA Warner Southern College used balanced scoring, a lethal outside touch and a strong defensive effort to pull off a 65-59 upset of the Wildcats on their home floor.

"It's a tough opener and it only gets tougher from here; that's a fact,'' said B-CU men's basketball coach Clifford Reed. "We just have a new influx of guys and you have new guys who have never been through (a Division I opener) and they don't understand.''

John Holmes, a JC transfer to B-CU this winter out of Des Moines (Iowa) Area Community College, paced the Wildcats with a game-high 23 points and eight rebounds, while hitting all six of his field goal attempts on the evening.

Holmes got some assistance out of senior Jimmy Hudson, who tallied 10 points and six rebounds before fouling out with 2:53 left to play, and freshman big man Kyle Cook, who pulled down a game-high 10 rebounds (9 on the defensive glass). Senior Jordan Carrier also tallied 12 points on the evening.

Warner Southern's hounding defense limited the Wildcats to just 18-of-48 shooting from the floor, but it still took some clutch free throw shooting by the Royals in the closing minutes to put the game away.

"You have to give a hand to (Warner coach) Sean Hanrahan and his staff. They just came in and did a good job,'' said Reed. "We just got outplayed. They wanted it a little more and just outplayed us.''

In the Wildcats' defense, B-CU did go into battle a little short-handed as senior Dwayne Pettus was attending to a death in the family, junior Josh Cummings sat out for disciplinary reasons and highly-touted freshman Gerrell Knightshead is still awaiting clearance from the NCAA Clearinghouse.

B-CU could've used some extra firepower against the Royals, who had nine players see at least 10 minutes or more, while five B-CU players were forced into 28 minutes or more of work - and as a result B-CU committed 26 turnovers.

"The turnovers and the inability to defend really hurt us,'' said Reed. "We probably spend 60 percent of the time working on defense. It's a commitment to being good at it and we just haven't made a commitment to it and don't understand the significance of it.''

In the first half someone forgot to tell visiting Warner Southern College that it was a smaller NAIA program.

Behind 5-of-13 shooting from 3-point range, the Royals jumped out to an early lead and led the entire first half behind the play of hot-handed guard Brandon Hamilton, who finished with a team-high 19 points.

Hamilton made five of six field goals from beyond the 3-point arc and scored half of the Royals' 34 first-half points.

Keeping B-CU in the game in the opening half was its size and edge underneath as the Wildcats outrebounded the visitors 19-14 in the opening half and outscored them 16-8 in the paint.

With its long-range gunners making shots, Warner scored 12 of its points off of B-CU's 13 first-half turnovers.

Holmes paced the Wildcats in the first half with 16 points and five rebounds. The 6-5 junior out of Salisbury, Md., hit all five of his field goals and 6-of-7 free throws in the opening half while all but one of his first-half rebounds came on the offensive glass.

Warner hit a three to open the second half before B-CU went on a 10-4 run and took its first lead of the night at 41-39 off of a jumper by senior Hudson.

Hudson's shot must've been the wakeup call for the Royals, who responded with a 15-4 run of their own and claimed a 54-45 lead with just 9:53 left to play.

Behind scoring from Kevan Creppy, Dominique Whatley and John Anderson, the Wildcats whittled the lead back down to 56-53 with 5:07 left to play.

Warner then made enough shots down the line to hold on for the win.