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Pirates stumble in regular
season finale
From electronic and staff reports
©2011 Bonesville.net
All rights reserved.
UAB poured ice water on
red-hot East Carolina Saturday night in Birmingham, snuffing out the
Pirates' three-game winning streak with a 66-48 rout and securing its
first outright Conference USA regular season title in the process.
Coming off
back-to-back-to-back victories over
Texas-El Paso,
Rice and
Memphis, ECU (16-14, 8-8 C-USA) carried over the momentum for 13 seconds,
just long enough for sophomore forward Darrius Morrow to score the
game's first basket.
Things went south from
there for the Pirates, who missed their next nine shots and didn't tally
another point for almost seven minutes.
In the meantime, UAB
(22-7, 12-4)
scored 10 straight points, established a stranglehold on momentum and,
aided by continued poor shooting by ECU, was on its way to a 31-12
halftime lead.
In the first half, the
Pirates were only 5-of-27 from the field (18.5 percent) and 1-of-9 from
3-point range (11.1 percent).
ECU never seriously
threatened in the second half, whittling the deficit to no closer than
13.
Senior guard Jamarr
Sanders led the Blazers with a game-high 15 points.
Junior reserve forward
Cameron Moore had 13, senior guard Aaron Johnson added 11 and sophomore
forward Ovie Soko and sophomore guard Dexter Fields contributed 10
apiece for UAB.
Morrow and sophomore guard
Corvonn Gaines each scored 13 points and senior guard Jontae Sherrod had
11 for the Pirates.
The loss left East
Carolina in a seventh-place tie with Southern Methodist in the final
league standings, but the Mustangs will have the No. 7 seed in the Buick
C-USA Championship Tournament by virtue of
their
46-41 win over the Pirates on Feb. 2.
As the eighth seed, ECU
will face No. 9 seed Central Florida on Wednesday at 1 p.m. in the
opening game of the tournament at the Don Haskins Center, UTEP's home
court.
In a pair of regular
season matchups, the Pirates prevailed over the Golden Knights
74-62 on Jan. 19 in Orlando and
68-61
on Feb. 5 in Greenville.
Top-seed UAB, which has a
first-round bye, will take on the winner of the ECU-UCF game on Thursday
at 1 p.m. with the victor advancing to Friday's semifinals.
The quarterfinal and
semifinal matchups will be televised by CBS College Sports.
The championship game, set
for a network broadcast by CBS, will be played on Saturday at 11:30 a.m.
View Tournament Bracket
(Times listed on bracket are Mountain Time)
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BOX SCORE
ALABAMA-BIRMINGHAM 66, EAST CAROLINA 48
Date:
Saturday, Mar. 5, 2011.
Place: Bartow Arena, Birmingham, AL.
Attendance: 7,971.
Records: ECU 16-14, 8-8 Conference USA; UAB 22-7, 12-4.
SCORE BY PERIODS 1
2 FINAL
East Carolina 12
36 - 48
Alabama-Birmingham
31 35 - 66
EAST CAROLINA
PIRATES
(16-14, 8-8
C-USA)
# PLAYER FG 3PT FT
R PTS MIN
01 Darrius Morrow...... f 6-12 0-0
1-4 4 13 38
21 Jamar Abrams........ f 3-7 2-4
0-0 4 8 31
11 Corvonn Gaines...... g 4-6 3-5
2-4 2 13 37
23 Erin Straughn....... g 0-3 0-1
0-0 2 0 18
24 Jontae Sherrod...... g 3-10 2-5
3-5 8 11 33
03 Petar Torlak.......... 0-0 0-0
0-0 1 0 4
10 Brock Young........... 1-7 0-2
1-2 4 3 28
12 Robert Sampson........ 0-2 0-2
0-0 1 0 9
33 Chad Wynn............. 0-0 0-0
0-0 1 0 2
TEAM.....................
2
TOTALS................... 17-47 7-19 7-15 29
48 200
PERCENT.................. 36.2 36.8 46.7
UAB BLAZERS
(22-7, 12-4
C-USA)
# PLAYER FG 3PT FT
R PTS MIN
03 Anthony Criswell.... f 2-4 0-0
0-1 3 4 15
32 Ovie Soko........... f 4-4 0-0
2-5 10 10 25
01 Aaron Johnson....... g 5-9 1-3
0-0 4 11 38
04 Jamarr Sanders...... g 5-14 2-9
3-4 4 15 35
23 Dexter Fields....... g 3-7 2-6
2-2 2 10 26
02 Mike Jones............ 0-3 0-1
0-0 0 0 4
05 Robert Williams....... 0-0 0-0
0-0 0 0 4
10 Karl Moton............ 0-0 0-0
0-0 0 0 2
21 Beas Hamga............ 0-0 0-0
0-0 1 0 3
22 Cameron Moore......... 5-8 0-1
3-3 8 13 28
24 Preston Purifoy....... 0-1 0-1
0-0 0 0 8
25 Quincy Taylor......... 1-4 1-3
0-0 2 3 12
TEAM.....................
3
TOTALS................... 25-54 6-24 10-15 37 66 200
PERCENT.................. 46.3 25.0 66.7
Officials:
Steve Olson, Greg Rennegarbe, Charles Robinson.
Technical Fouls: None.
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PAGE UPDATED
03/06/11 08:17 AM.
©2011 Bonesville.net and
other publishers. All rights rights reserved. This material may not be
published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Game accounts and
statistics may be compiled from various sources, including but not limited
to staff contributions and East Carolina University, opposing team and Conference USA reports.
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