Ball State Men’s Basketball opened up its 2018-19 season taking on UIndy in a exhibition matchup. After a closer first quarter, in the Cardinals were able to pull away in the second half for a 92-76 win.
“I was proud of our guys,” head coach James Whitford said. “I thought we played a good game, completed and UIndy is a good team, so we had a lot of respect for the rightfully so. I thought our guys played the game the right way.”
Junior Forward Kyle Mallers led the Cardinals with 25 points knocking down 5 of 7 three point attempts and finished with an 80 percent field goal accuracy.
“I hit the first one and felt pretty good,” Mallers said. “I just kept getting open and as someone who is counted on to shoot the ball, I shot them and hit them.”
Redshirt junior Tahjai Teague was hot out of the gate as well racking up 20 points on the night with 14 in just the first half. However, Teague said most of his energy was put into getting back to play defense in the first half of the game.
“We gave up too many points, so I just tried to use most of my energy on the defense,” Teague said. “Kyle was hot, KJ can score at will and other people can score, so I was focused on stopping my man than trying to score in the second half.”
Throughout the first half, the game looked to be evenly matched as the half would end in a 51-51 tie. Both teams would have a field goal percentage in the low 50s and down five three-pointers. There wouldn’t be a lot of breathing room for either team as the largest lead belonged to the Cardinals at only 5 points.
“I was telling my guys in the locker room that UIndy reminds me of that nightmare team in the NCAA tournament that no one wants to play,” Whitford said. “They can shoot threes and you’re used to having these big guys out there who are both are worried about them picking and popping them. They are a little undersized over the course of a 35 game season, that size should pay a price cause other teams can pumble them. After one game, their ability to spread you out proves that they’re a hard team to play and have a hard style to play against.”
Post-halftime the Cardinals were able to gain some ground on the Greyhounds. A 10-5 run in the mid-second half would give the Cardinals a 7-point lead and they wouldn’t look back. Mallers would knock down nine points behind the line in the second half. While the team walked away with the win, there were echoed sentiments of disappointment after allowing the Greyhounds to put 51-points up on the board in the first half.
“I would give our defense performance tonight a C,” Teague said. “Letting up 51 points in the first half is not good, but our second half performance was probably at a B+. We gave up 25 points, so we cut it in half in 20 mins.”
With the first game of the season in the books, the Cardinals are looking to focus in on themselves before taking on Indiana State on Tuesday and No. 24 Purdue next Saturday.
“We’ll try to forget about Indiana State at Sunday’s practice and focus on us,” Whitford said. “What are the things that we were trying to accomplish in this game, what did we need to clean up from this game will be addressed at Sunday’s practice. Monday will be more about Indiana State. The first day is usually rough in learning your own lessons from the last game.”
Contact Jack Williams with any comments at jgwilliams@bsu.edu or on Twitter @jackgwilliams
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