This afternoon the Bearcats (11-5, 2-1 AAC) welcomed in No. 2 ranked Houston (15-1, 3-0) to Fifth Third Arena for an AAC showdown. The Cougars are arguably the best team in the country and have proved that through the first half of the season as their only loss of the season came to No. 8 ranked Alabama back on December 10th.
The Bearcats would continue to go with the two big lineup as Jeremiah Davenport will come off the bench for the second straight game. This could play a huge role in this contest as Houston is a tough and physical team that loves to play tough inside.
First Half Takeaways
Early Turnovers
The Bearcats would take an early 5-0 lead before Houston sparked a 10-0 run after five turnovers from the Bearcats in the first five minutes. After setting the tone early, the Cougars would rally back and silence the Bearcat faithful as they looked to turn it up a notch.
Landers Nolley and Mika Adams Woods
Nolley would light up Fifth Third after a beautiful ball fake led to a wide open three to cut the deficit to three. However, he wouldn’t stop there as he came right back with another contested three to tie this one at 18. Nolley would start 4-of-4 from the field with 12 points as he was feeding off the energy here at Fifth Third Arena early and you could sense it. Nolley would finish the first half with 12 points as Houston was really honing in on their defense late in the half as they held Nolley without a point in the last eight minutes. Mika Adams-Woods was arguably having his best game of the season as he finished the first half with 12 points on 5-of-7 shooting as he was doing a great job facilitating the offense as he continues to progress as conference play kicks off.
Houston’s physicality inside
Jarace Walker continued to show why he is arguably one of the best players in the country as he was making his presence known early this afternoon. Walker would start the game with 11 points on 5-9 shooting. Walker was drawing a lot of attention which freed up Tramon Mark and Marcus Sasser who each finished the first half with 7 points apiece. Houston’s physicality on the defensive end is what changed the first half as they held the Bearcats big man (Oguama, Lakhin, Ezipke) to just 2 points and three rebounds in the first 20 minutes.
