JACKSONVILLE, Fla – Jacksonville University men's basketball proved it was capable of runs in its first two conference games, erasing two double-digit second half deficits to win. On Saturday, they started the game with one, rolling to an 87-69 win over Lipscomb to stay unbeaten in ASUN Conference play. 

"I thought we did a pretty good job, give our guys a lot of credit," said Head Coach Tony Jasick.

"I thought we caught Lipscomb on a night where they weren't as sharp as they are normally; I'd like to think we had something to do with it."

An 18-5 first half run put Jacksonville ahead for good, and got the raucous crowd at Swisher Gym involved early, as the Dolphins built a 20-11 lead over a 4:51 minute span that started with an Antwon Clayton jumper and ended with a Devin Harris dunk.

JU forced 11 first half Lipscomb turnovers and turned them into 18 points, constantly making the Bisons play on their heels defensively, all while holding the ASUN's leading scorer Garrison Mathews to just three points.

"We felt like we had to give Mathews all kinds of attention. He got really aggressive late, but I thought for the majority of the game our guys were pretty locked in on what we were trying to do there," said Jasick.

A personal 5-0 scoring stretch from JD Notae built the Dolphins lead to double-figures for the first time, 28-18 with 7:56 left in the first, and from there it grew to as many as 20 by halftime, when JU drew up a play out of a timeout for six foot 10 junior center Radwan Bakkali to drain a three to end the half, his second made on the season in three tries.

"Defense was key, defense turned into offense and we got going," said Notae.

Lipscomb had a run of their own, but it came too little too late. After JU extended the lead to as many as 24 early in the second half, the Bisons picked away until they managed to score 11 straight over a 1:56 stretch to cut it to 10 with 1:44 left. The Dolphins solved the press to free up Jalyn Hinton for a breakaway dunk, and JU pulled away with eight unanswered, six of those coming at the foul line.

The win moves Jacksonville to 3-0 in the ASUN, tied for first place with FGCU two weeks into the season. The 3-0 start is the best since the 2010-11 season.

"Hopefully we can continue to ride the wave and continue to play well on the road again next week," said Jasick.

JU heads on the road next week for a two game trip, starting on Thursday in Spartanburg, S.C. against USC Upstate, who lost to Stetson on Saturday and are 0-3 in the league.

TIP-INS

• Jalyn Hinton went 8-8 from the field tonight. The last time a Dolphin went perfect from the field when shooting five or more shots was Tanner Rubio, who went 5-5 on Jan. 14, 2017 vs. USC Upstate
• Four Dolphins scored in double-figures. Notae led the way with 21, followed by Harris (19), Hinton (16) and Cody Helgeland (12)
• Helgeland was nearly perfect tonight. The redshirt-senior from Toccoa, Ga. was 3-3 from the field, 2-2 from three and added four rebounds, three assists, a career-high blocks and one steal with no turnovers
• Harris sniffed a triple-double for the second straight game, grabbing nine rebounds and dishing out seven assists to go with his 19 points
• The four straight wins is the longest winning streak since Jan. 23-Feb. 6, 2016, when the Dolphins won five straight

QUOTABLE

"I don't know that we did, but hopefully we can learn that moving forward."

Tony Jasick when asked about his young team closing out a game strong