ODU basketball has a roaring good night

NORFOLK

Another night, another opposing point guard bottled up by Old Dominion's Kent Bazemore.

On Saturday, ODU's lengthy sophomore shut down Delaware's Jawan Carter, holding him 15 points below his average. On Tuesday, Bazemore made the acquaintance of Jeremy Goode of Mount St. Mary's, draping him like a blanket in the Monarchs' 64-38 win at the Constant Center.

"It's kind of an ego-type thing," Bazemore said. "Coach allowed me to stop one of their premier players. I feel like I can do it, and I go out there and try to do my best."

Bazemore had plenty of help, on a night in which the Monarchs mixed their defenses and held the Mount to its lowest point total since 1950. The Mountaineers shot just 29 percent, and committed 18 turnovers.

"We're trying to find our offensive identity," coach Milan Brown said. "Against a team of this caliber, it's not a good game to find out who's going to score, and where the points are going to come from."

Not with the 6-foot-6 Bazemore enveloping the 5-9 Goode, who was held to four points - 11 below his average - and had five turnovers. Bazemore did a similar number on Carter, holding him to five points.

"The last couple games we've been able to use Kent's length and size out front a little bit and I think you're seeing the shooting percentage on those particular players, and maybe even the attempts they're getting, to be minimized a little bit," ODU coach Blaine Taylor said.

Indeed, Goode got only seven shots, and made only two. Turns out, that was a decent shooting night by Tuesday's standards. Forwards Kelly Beidler (Tallwood High) and Shawn Atupem went 4 for 21.

The undersized post players had difficulty against ODU's big frontcourt, on both ends of the floor. Though the Monarchs shot just 38 percent, they cleaned up on the boards, grabbing 50 rebounds, 22 offensive.

Gerald Lee led ODU with 16 points. Darius James added 14, while Bazemore had 10.

The Monarchs (6-3) missed a few too many gimmes around the rim, and went just 3 of 13 from behind the arc. But they cleaned up many of their misses, and kept Mount St. Mary's (3-6) off balance with their defense.

"At points they were confused at what kind of defense we were in," Lee said. "Every time we play aggressive defense good things happen for us."

Zone or man-to-man, the result was the same for Mount St. Mary's: frustration. In the end, it was hard to argue with Brown's final summation, delivered with a sigh.

"You're not going to win too many basketball games scoring 38 points," he said.

Ed Miller, (757) 446-2372, ed.miller@pilotonline.com