Cincinnati would start the second half with great defense as Evansville would not be able to score their first basket until 14:01. Cincinnati would go on an 11-1 run during that time and increase their lead 42-23. Cincinnati’s bigs were everywhere in this game as Viktor Lakhin made his mark in the second half swatting away an Evansville floater and providing valuable minutes off the bench. All the bigs including Oguama, Lakhin, Ado and Koval made big plays all night for the Bearcats. The Bearcats would follow suit with a couple of defensive plays and long runs to increase the lead to 53-33. Cincinnati would run out the rest of the clock with Evansville as the Aces could not get anything going. Whenever Evansville would respond Cincinnati would bounce back as the lowest the Bearcat lead would get in the second half was 15. Cincinnati would go on to end the game on a 7-0 run as Lakhin and A.J. McGinnis would cap off the Bearcats big opening win as Cincinnati would win 65-43
Wes Miller and company got off to a fast start as they shot 44% from the field and held Evansville to 26% shooting today. Cincinnati forced 15 turnovers and had six big blocks by four different players to set the tone. Leading scorer for Cincinnati was Davenport who had 11 points and a Bearcat high eight rebounds to go along with it. Miller’s team showed they have a ton of depth and a lot of players that can make plays. Mason Madsen came off the bench with nine points and Viktor Lakhin came off the bench or his 1st minutes as a Bearcat and put up seven points.
Cincinnati is now 1-0 and will be back at home on Saturday when they welcome the 1-0 Georgia Bulldogs.
