Jan. 30, 2014
Box Score
(San Diego, Calif.) - The USD Toreros, playing their first home game since January 11th, turned in arguably their best defensive effort of the season tonight in shutting down the Saint Mary's Gaels, 61-43. SMC came into the contest in second place in the WCC and averaging 76.3 points, but the Toreros held them to season-lows of 43 points and 25.0 percent shooting from the field. The Toreros were led by
Johnny Dee (17 points) and 14 points each from
Dennis Kramer and
Duda Sanadze.
"It was a very good defensive effort tonight," said head coach Bill Grier. "Probably our best of the year, although we've had some other good defensive efforts this season. The one thing about Saint Mary's is that they are such a good program and have had so much success. The guys know how to win. They are physically tough. What I felt so great about tonight was that I thought our guys were really focused on the game plan, didn't deviate from it, and I thought we played with a lot of toughness tonight."
In the first half the Toreros were sparked by 12 points from Sanadze as they went into the locker room ahead, 29-18. Sanadze was matched by Gaels' center Brad Waldow with 12 points who scored most of his on inside power moves. Sanadze made both of his three-point attempts in the half as USD converted 4-of-8 threes.
In the second half Christopher Anderson buried a three and Kramer added two free throws as USD jumped ahead 34-18. The closest SMC (16-6, 6-3 WCC) would get is 12 points (44-32) on two Stephen Holt free throws with 10:15 to go. From there Dee hit a three and Chris Sarbaugh scored 5 straight points and USD would cruise to victory the rest of the way.
The double digit victory was a nice change of pace after USD's last five games had been decided by five points or less. Johnny Dee missed his first free throw attempt of the game to see his school record streak end at 47. He moved into the #8 all-time scoring spot at USD, and now with 1,331 career points will next chase down #7 Andre Laws (1,337 points, 1998-2002) and #6 Scott Thompson (1,379 points, 1983-87).
Saint Mary's was paced by Waldow (18 points, 9 rebounds), while USD's top rebounders were Kramer (8) and Jito Kok (7 rebounds, 3 blocked shots). The Toreros (13-10, 4-6 WCC) return to the JCP this Saturday to take on the Pacific Tigers (11-9, 2-7 WCC) at 1:00 pm. It is the WCC Game of the Week and the Tigers come to town off of a 88-78 loss at BYU.
