UNF men’s basketball team lost to the South Carolina Gamecocks 81-56 to kick off the season. The Ospreys were 0-9 against the Southeastern Conference before falling against the Gamecocks on Friday night.
This will kick off a stretch of 12 of the first 15 games of the season on the road. Dallas Moore had all 6 points in a 6-6 tie, before South Carolina went on a 16-2 run over the next 6 minutes.
At 25-10, back-to-back three pointers by Osprey sophomore Chris Davenport and junior Trent Mackey cut the deficit to 25-16, but that was as close as they would get.
The Gamecocks answered with a 13-0 run to put the game out of reach. Dallas Moore led the team with 21 points and Junior Beau Beech had 9, 3 for 7 from the three-point range.
“These non-conference games are going to allow us to find out who we are and find out who we are under stressful times,” said UNF Head Coach Matthew Driscoll. “One thing you want to do is find out how you can work through that, find out which combinations. These kind of games expose you to concerns in different areas based how other people are going to play you.”
Demetrius Henry and Ty Johnson each had 12 points for South Carolina. UNF had 15 turnovers while shooting 34 percent from the field and 31 percent from behind the arc.
“Really good opening win for us. My biggest concern was that they returned all their perimeter players and they were really good last year,” said South Carolina Head Coach Frank Martin.
“They could really score and I thought defensively we did a really good job.”
Driscoll came into the game with 99 wins and will attempt to secure his 100th on tonight during the home opener against Webber International University at 7 p.m.
Gallery photos by Jeff Blake, USA Today Sports with permission from South Carolina Athletic Media Department.
[doptg id=”75″]Email Charles White at reporter13@unfspinnaker.com
