PROVO, Utah – Nick Emery, Jake Toolson and Kyle Davis led the Blue squad to a 66-60 victory in the Papa John's Cougar Tipoff Wednesday night at the Marriott Center.
“I thought that it was fun to just watch the guys compete in a different setting than what we've been doing for the last five or six weeks," BYU coach Dave Rose said. "It will be interesting when I start watching the film to evaluate each guy. I like the way that both teams competed – especially in the second half when the game was close and tight."
After trailing by 23 with 1:50 left in the first half, the Blue squad came back to take its first lead on an old-fashioned three-point play by Davis with 5:28 left in the game. After the game was tied at 57-all, Blue outscored White 9-3 over the final 2:30.
Zac Seljaas and Emery scored 19 points to lead their teams, while Toolson added 16, Elijah Bryant 14, Davis 10 and Cory Calvert 10. Davis pulled down 11 rebounds for a double-double for the Blue squad.
Jamal Aytes was the only other Cougar with more than five rebounds as he finished with 6 boards and six points.
The White squad, which had a total 28 games experience at BYU, pushed to a 23-4 lead 10 minutes in on hot shooting from 3-point range. Four straight 3-pointers from Seljaas and Calvert was a 12-0 run as part of a 19-3 streak.
The 19-point advantage held up to the half when the White squad led 37-19.
An 8-0 run started by two Cooper Ainge free throws put the Blue squad down only two at 46-44. An 11-3 run with four points from Emery, three from Davis, three from Toolson and one from Aytes gave Blue the lead for the first time, with five of those points coming from the free-throw line.
In the final minute with a six-point lead, Blue was 4 of 6 from the free-throw line to close out the victory.
Senior center Nate Austin returned to the court for the Cougars after missing the majority of last season due to injury. Austin finished with three points and three rebounds in 23 minutes.
Chase Fischer played the majority of his minutes in the first half for Blue scoring seven points on 3 of 6 shooting, including a 3-pointer. He added two assists, a steal and a rebound in 26 minutes.
Newcomers saw a lot of action for the White squad as freshman Jakob Hartsock scored eight points and grabbed four rebounds in 33 minutes, while freshman Braiden Shaw scored six points and grabbed four boards in 34 minutes. Redshirt freshman Jordan Chatman finished with three points, two rebounds, an assist and a steal in 22 minutes, the majority of which came in the first half. Walk-on Davin Guinn played 3 minutes, grabbing a rebound.
The Cougars face Arizona Christian in their first exhibition game on Friday, Oct 30, at 7:30 p.m. MT. The game will be televised on BYUtv and can be heard on the Cougar IMG Sports Network, KSL 1160 AM and 102.7 FM, BYU Radio and Sirius XM 143.
Quotes
BYU head coach Dave Rose
Opening statement:
“I thought that it was fun to just watch the guys compete in a different setting than what we've been doing for the last five or six weeks. It will be interesting when I start watching the film to evaluate each guy. I like the way that both teams competed – especially in the second half when the game was close and tight."
“All in all, we'll just try and learn from it. We probably won't get to it until Saturday. I imagine we'll spend a little bit of time tomorrow trying to figure out this team that's coming in to play us on Friday, but I liked what I saw.”
On freshmen leading both teams in scoring:
“I think you see in freshmen – especially these two kids tonight – they have flashes of really good play. Some days are really awesome and the next couple of days they struggle a little bit. That'll be the key for us, to find the consistent young guys who can actually help us. The Blue team got off to a terrible start, but you start looking out there and trying to break it down: you've got one guy that didn't play last year, one guy that didn't play the last two years, another guy that didn't play the last two years. I think they were a little nervous. We were really stale offensively. We didn't play on attack very much. The White team just came out and buried shots. The second half, I thought that both teams actually competed better. The White team turned it over quite a bit, but I like those young guys. I think that we're going to have to find a whole group of them that are going to have to play consistent minutes for us.”
On how the teams were divided:
“This is what kind of happens – you split the thing up with the guys who know the most, seem to play the most – especially in the post. I wanted Braiden and Jakob to play a lot of mintues tonight. And so, that's kind of why I had those other post guys play like that. It forces everyone to keep them on the floor. I think both of them fouled out, but I thought that they had some real flashes. Braiden had some really aggressive plays early in the game and Jakob hit a few jump shots. We're trying to build that whole group. We knew we weren't going to play Nate all that much. Nate's the guy we're trying to monitor a little bit just to get to the season and then hopefully we can get him to be really aggressive from Nov. 13 to April 1.”
On the offense of the White team:
"We've been practicing all summer and all of fall, so we went out there looking to show what we've done in practice and showing what we can do."
On no being afraid to shoot:
"To play for Coach Rose, you have to be able to shoot it. That's what I've come in doing and Nick has come in that way too. You have to be able to go out there and do what he expects you to do."
On being a freshman:
"It's not really about age right now. Spain helped us get our jitters out and now it's time to play as a team. Scoring is all that matters during the game. It doesn't matter who the scorer is or not. It's how we play as a team."
On the slow first half:
"I think we went out in the first half excited to play, and we let that and the crowd get to us. It's the first time we had a crowd in a while. But, I think that second half comeback shows just how much heart this team has and how we trust each other. What we played in the second half was fun basketball."
Highlight of the night:
"I think the game was a grind, because the college game is a lot different than the high school game that we're used to. It was fun to get out there and play with these guys under the lights. It was nice to get that first game underneath us and prove how good we are."
On Kyle Davis:
"Kyle's a big body. I think we've been lacking that the past few years. He's able to score the ball too. I also think he's an under-rated rebounder. If a shot is missed, he's always getting a tip on the ball, which is huge, because it flows right into our offense."
Are you a better free-throw shooting team than tonight?
"I definitely think so. There were nerves in some of those free throws tonight. We work hard in practice on those, and we'll continue to work hard. Free throws will be big in the game. They'll be big for us this year."
On the second half:
"In that first half, we weren't making shots and the White team was drilling them. In the second half, we were a lot more settled and confident. We played the way we normally play in practice. I think that was huge for us."
On the shorter shot clock:
"I don't think the 30 second shot clock makes a difference for our offense. We get the ball up the court in two seconds, so that gives us 28 seconds to run our offense. The last 10 seconds is an adjustment, but you just have to play it like a game winner. You're battling against the clock, and we've got good enough shooters to knock down the shots. I think we'll be good."