PEMBROKE — On a day celebrating the past successes of The University of North Carolina at Pembroke men’s basketball program, the current edition of Braves made one remarkable run in the second half of Saturday’s game against Augusta that will join the annals of program history.
And as the run continued — one that turned an early deficit in the second half into a 94-56 victory — the English E. Jones Center came to life with a roar progressively louder for each successive basket, interrupted only by a lengthy round of grateful and nostalgic applause when several dozen Braves alumni were introduced during a timeout in the midst of the run.
“It was a great atmosphere,” UNCP interim head coach Tony Jones said. “We usually have a great crowd for Alumni Day. With everybody hitting shots, (David Strother) taking some really good threes — I’m calling the plays and he’s pulling up and hitting them; I’m not going to stop him — the crowd was great. We had a great energy, and we definitely fed on that. Our defense fed off that, playing the gaps and getting very hyped, and that led to fast-break points.”
The 41-6 run, which took up over 13 minutes of the second-half clock, came after UNCP had trailed 39-37 at halftime, never leading in the opening 20 minutes but never letting the Jaguars get too far ahead. An 8-2 run to end the half pulled them to within the 2-point deficit at the break.
UNCP (12-4, 6-2 Peach Belt Conference) took its first lead just 8 seconds into the second half when Jordan Ratliffe scored a traditional 3-point play for a 40-39 lead.
After Augusta (10-5, 5-2 PBC) answered with a Tyshaun Crawford free throw and a Rafael Montiero layup for the 42-40 lead, the run was on. Akia Pruitt hit a 3-pointer for a 43-42 lead, and after a Ratliffe free throw, Strother had a stretch of eight straight points, including two triples, to take a 52-44 lead.
“I was just trying to play off my instincts; trust my instincts,” Strother said. “I thought I could make those shots, so I took them.”
A Tyrell Kirk jumper, Spencer Levi made a dunk — a point when the noise in the building may have peaked — gave the Braves a 56-44 lead. After another Strother 3, Levi hit two layups and a free throw to quickly stretch the lead to 64-44 with 10:38 to go.
A layup by Jack Johnson ended the immediate run at 24-2, but the onslaught of Braves offense continued as the game moved into the later stages of the second half, including a stretch of five straight points by Pruitt and a pair of consecutive 3-pointers by Tyrell Kirk.
When the dust cleared, the Braves led at one point by 40. The Braves shot 71.0 percent in the second half, while holding the Jaguars to a 29.2 percent rate from the floor.
Pruitt had 15 points, 10 rebounds, five assists and four blocks.
“I just tried to do whatever I can for the team, just play hard. I try to block shots, rebound — whoever rebounds the hardest in this game usually wins, so that’s what I try to do,” Pruitt said.
Behind Pruitt, Ratliffe finished with 14 points; Strother had 13 points and four assists; Kirk had 10 points and four assists; Levi scored nine points with six rebounds; Micah Kinsey scored seven points with eight assists. The team’s bench scored 36 points.
“That’s probably one of our biggest strengths,” Levi said of the team’s depth. “Nobody had over 15 points, nobody had a crazy game, but you saw the other night (Tyrell Kirk) can go for 33; these two (David Strother and Akia Pruitt) can too, every night. We just know that we have to trust oneanother, and we’ll get results like that all the time.”
Augusta jumped out to an early 14-5 lead, and led by nine on two more occasions. Trailing 19-10, the Braves used a 7-2 to run to get within four at 21-17, but Augusta gradually upped its lead to eight at 37-29 before UNCP’s run to end the half.
“The message (at halftime) was simple, we just made a few adjustments,” Jones said. “Defensively, we just played better. It wasn’t our offense; our defense contributed to our offense. The guys played really hard and were in the gaps, and made them take some tough shots and forced some bad passes, and capitalized on that.”
After posting convinving wins over two of the top four teams in the Peach Belt — a 19-point win over Lander preceded Saturday’s game against Augusta — the Braves move into second place in the league, two games behind USC Aiken, and now travel to South Carolina to face the Pacers, who are 8-0 in PBC play. The Braves couldn’t ask for more momentum headed into the game between the league’s top two teams.
“We’re just going to try to ride this wave,” Jones said. “We played Lander, who was top three in the league, then Augusta, No. 2, and now we’ve got Aiken up next. We were trying to go 2-0 this week; we accomplished that, so now we’re just trying to 2-0 next week.”
