VALDOSTA, Ga. - The Valdosta State Blazers returned to form on Tuesday night and cruised to a dominant 107-81 win over Tuskegee in non-conference action at The Complex.
The Blazer offense reached the century mark in points scored for the fourth time this season, thanks in part to the efforts of
Beau Justice,
KJ James, and
Tyrone Sam, who each scored 20-plus points in the contest. Justice led the way with 25, while James and Sam added 22 and 21, respectively.
"KJ is a senior this year and I think he sees that senior cliff, in that he knows his collegiate career is coming to an end," said Head Coach
Mike Helfer of James, who delivered what was arguably his most aggressive effort of the season. "I think he's trying squeeze everything he can out of every minute. He's playing hard, he's playing smart, and he's playing aggressive, and I enjoyed seeing that from him tonight."
Despite falling behind 40-19 a little over midway through the opening period, the Tigers managed to keep the game respectable throughout the night and even pulled to within as few as 10 three different times in the first 10 minutes of the second half.
"They have a couple of guards that can really shoot it," added Helfer. "They started to lean on those players late in the first half, and they started making a bunch of shots. I told our guys at halftime that we needed to focus on playing inside out. We were either going to drive it into the paint or feed it in there, and our guys did that."
Valdosta State used a 54.9 percent shooting effort to maintain control of the contest and eventually run away with the convincing win. The Blazers also won the rebounding battle 41-31, which led to 16 second chance points, and VSU also enjoyed an impressive 41-point performance off the bench by the reserves.
"We're trying to improve our transition game," said Helfer. "We're trying to make better decisions in the open court and I think we really started to do that tonight. That helped us offensively, and we just need to carry that into our next series of games."
With the win, the Blazers remained perfect at home and improved to 7-1 overall. Meanwhile, the Tigers dropped to 1-8 on the season.
Next up for the Blazers, its a return to the road for a matchup against Fort Valley State in Fort Valley, Ga. The contest marks a rematch from earlier this season between the two teams, which Valdosta State held on to win 83-81. Tip time is slated for 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, December 12th.
