Five Aggies score in double figures

Box Score
WACO, Texas, December 28, 2006 – The North Carolina A&T men have the shooters, the experience and the depth to compete with schools from major conferences. One element they still lack, however, is size. Unfortunately, size mattered on Thursday night in Baylor’s 91-71 win over the Aggies at the Ferrell Center.

The Aggies, who were playing without their leading rebounder Jason Wills and starter Angelo Hernandez, were led by Steven Rush’s 17 points. Four other Aggies scored in double figures as Austin Ewing finished with 13, Greg Roberts ended the night with 11 and Nick Wilson had 10. Trahern Chaplin added 11 points and six boards.

“I think our kids played hard,’’ said N.C. A&T head coach Jerry Eaves. “But us shooting 39 percent for the game makes it difficult to reach our goal of scoring 80 points tonight. We need to shoot 50 percent to win ball games. We go the looks we wanted. Man-to-man they couldn’t handle us – they played zone the entire second half, but the fact they had so much size was too much for us to overcome.”

The Bears, who possess two seven-footers, out-rebounded the Aggies 44-25. It helped the Bears shoot 57.4 percent from the floor.

Despite the Bears size advantage, the Aggies trailed by just seven at the half, 43-36. The Aggies cut the lead to four, 44-40, on an Austin Ewing jumper 47 seconds into the second half.  After Ewing’s jumper, the Bears went on a run that would give double-digit cushion the rest of the night.

Henry Dugat, who hit four threes on the night and had 19 points, started the run with an open 3-pointer from the right corner. After a Kevin Rogers free throw and a short jumper by Chaplin, Dugat found himself open in the corner again for another Bears three that gave Baylor a 51-42 lead.

An Aaron Bruce three gave the Bears what was then their biggest lead of the night at 54-42 three minutes into the second half. The Aggies kept the Bears within their sights over the next five minutes. A rocket pass from Rush to Porter that led to a Porter layup kept the lead at 12, 63-51 with 12:08 to play. The Bears started their final push toward putting the Aggies away 30 seconds later. A Tweety Carter three ignited an 8-0 run that put the Bears up by 20 with 10:53 remaining.

“Offensively we saw what we wanted to see, we got great looks, but when you don’t knock down the shots, you’re not going to win.

N.C. A&T shot 41 percent in the first half. A Dugat three put the Bears up by 12, 36-24 with 4:01 remaining in the first half. The Aggies offense looked outstanding over a three-minute stretch they used to get back into the game.

Ewing swung the ball over to a wide open Rush for a three that cut the lead to nine. Ewing then pump faked a defender to get open for a jump shot that moved the Aggies within seven. The assists went to Rush. Nelson got into the passing attack with an assist to Ewing for a 3-pointer that made it 36-32. Wilson ended the 10-0 run by slipping off of a screen for an open 15-footer that closed the gap to two, 36-34 with 1:56 to go in the first half.

The Aggies will get another chance to showcase their offense on Saturday when they face Southern Methodist at 9 p.m., eastern in Dallas.