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Testy Bearcats ready to
pounce
By The Associated Press
Fuming from a blowout loss, Cincinnati was very charged up for its last game
and the result was an easy win.
The eighth-ranked Bearcats
should need no such motivation Wednesday when they host a Conference USA
matchup against last-place East Carolina, which has never won a league game
on the road.
Cincinnati was still stinging
from last Wednesday's 93-66 loss to then-No. 5 Louisville heading into its
visit to Southern Mississippi on Saturday. Coach Bob Huggins' squad
dominated from the outset and rolled to an 83-47 victory.
``Wednesday night, do you know
there was like 5 million people watching that game .... watching us get our
tails kicked,'' said Tony Bobbitt, who led the Bearcats with 19 points
Saturday. ``We still got that in our mind. Like `Coach Hug' said, he had
never been beat like that. That was embarrassing.''
Maybe the thoughts of falling
to Louisville, which knocked Cincinnati (14-1, 5-1) from the ranks of the
unbeaten, are still lingering.
``We wanted to come out and
get a little stress off our shoulders, but it's still on our shoulders
because that was embarrassing, man,'' Bobbitt said.
The only game of Cincinnati's
last six in which Bobbitt did not lead the team in scoring came in last
Wednesday's defeat, as he was held to eight points. The senior sixth man
scored at least 16 points in the other five games during that stretch to
raise his season average to 14.4.
Bobbitt is second on the team
to forward Jason Maxiell, who averages 14.7 points and a team-high 7.5
rebounds while shooting 54 percent from the field.
The Bearcats now host an
East Carolina team which has never won a C-USA road game since joining
the league three years ago. The Pirates (8-7, 0-5) have lost 14 straight
road games overall.
Cincinnati is 5-0 all-time
against East Carolina, though last season's two meetings were decided by a
combined seven points.
Alone at the bottom of C-USA,
the Pirates have gone 0-6 in January after winning their final five games of
2003. They have lost 11 consecutive conference games and have never defeated
a ranked opponent on the road.
Cincinnati has won 13 in a row
at home.
Only one of East Carolina's
conference losses this season has not been decided by double digits. The
Pirates failed to have one player score in double figures in Saturday's
70-47 loss at Saint Louis.
Derrick Wiley averages a
team-high 14.8 points for East Carolina. The team's second-leading scorer,
Gabriel Mikulas at 13.0 per game, was lost for the season two weeks ago with
a broken arm.
Copyright 2004
The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be
published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
02/23/2007 10:49:30 AM
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