Inady Legiste accounted for 19 points and 10 rebounds to lead the Tusculum men’s basketball team to an 88-77 win over Clayton State in the final game of the 2022 South Atlantic Conference / Peach Belt Conference Challenge at Pioneer Arena.
The Pioneers are off to their third 2-0 in the last four years, while Clayton State went 0-2 on the weekend.
Twelve (12) of the 13 Pioneers who saw action on Saturday found their way into the scoring column. Jalen Crowder and DJ Sinkler tallied 12 points each, KJ Crump and Justin Mitchell had eight points apiece, while the trio of Connor Jordan, James West IV and Kyle Brown finished with seven points each.
Travis Harper II led all scorers with 25 points as he went 9-of-12 from the floor including two 3-pointers and shot 5-of-5 from the free throw line. Christian Chambers added 18 points, while Kobie Johnson and Wes Williams finished with 15 and 10 points, respectively for the Lakers.
The Pioneers raced out to a 49-32 lead at halftime as TU forced 17 first half turnovers resulting into 26 points.
Tusculum led by as many as 22 points in the second half including 62-40 with 13:12 remaining. CSU scored 11 straight including a Harper dunk as the Lakers trimmed the deficit to 62-51 with 11 minutes to go.
After a Pioneer timeout, TU scored seven in a row including a three-pointer by Jordan and later increased its advantage out to 20 on two more occasions. Clayton State cut the deficit to single digits but only with 15 seconds in the game as Tusculum recorded the victory.
The Pioneers scored 32 points off of 22 turnovers by the Lakers. Tusculum shot 46 percent from the floor and 21-of-29 from the charity stripe (72.4%). CSU finished the contest shooting 49 percent including 16-of-31 in the second half (52%).
The Pioneers finished the game with 17 assists on its 29 made field goals, while committing 16 turnovers and recording 14 steals.
Tusculum returns to action Friday, Nov. 25, when they travel to NCAA Division I Furman University for an exhibition game in Greenville, South Carolina.
