Troy State hits brick wall

Published 12:00 am Friday, February 4, 2000

at Stetson in 17 point loss

By STEVEN G. WATSON

Sports Editor

The Trojan train came to a roaring halt Thursday night as Stetson applied the brake and an 88-71 win over the No. 1 team in the Trans America Athletic Conference.

The loss was only the second for Troy State in its last 11, a stretch that has the Trojans (14-7 overall, 10-2 in TAAC play) at the top of the TAAC and marked as the team to beat.

"It’s a feeling that we haven’t had in a long, long time," TSU head coach Don Maestri said. "I don’t think being on the road has anything to do with it. We went to Georgia State and beat them, we went to Campbell and played better than we did at home. I think it was just a matter of Stetson playing pretty good and we didn’t shoot the ball well.

"I think after a loss, first of all you can’t disintegrate," he continued. "You’ve got to look in the mirror and try and evaluate what you did. Then you have to get over it and go to work."

After TSU took a 40-37 lead into the locker room at the break, Stetson (12-9, 7-5) took advantage of an unbelievable Trojan cold streak that left them without a bucket for over four minutes.

In that time the Hatters went on a 13-1 run and continued to do what they do best ­ clean up in the paint.

The Hatters had plenty of missed shots by Troy State on the defensive end to clean up. After shooting for over 50 percent in the first half and 7-of-14 from behind the 3-point line, TSU hit for only 22.9 from the field in the second on 8-of-35 shooting.

On the other side of the ball, the Hatters shot over 50 percent in both halves to finish up with one of their best offensive performances of the year.

Stetson got all it could want and more from its reserves.

Will Robertson came off the bench to have a career night for the Hatters notching a game-high 25 points and 12 boards, only to be matched only by Santos Hampton’s double-double of 19 points and 12 rebounds, also off the bench.

Sebastian Singletary hit for 13 and grabbed eight boards to round out Stetson’s scoring. Detric Golden had a team-high 19 for the Trojans, but was only 2-of-12 from beyond the 3-point arc. Eugene Christopher and Robert Rushing both had 14.

Even with the loss, however, the Trojans still hold a firm lead on the No. 1 spot in the TAAC.

Jacksonville State fell to Georgia State on the road 91-77 making the Gamecocks 7-4 in conference play and Samford fell to Campbell 58-55 dropping its league record to 6-5.

Now the closest TAAC team to Troy State is GSU. With an 8-4 record they are two games behind TSU.

The Trojans play next at Jacksonville Saturday as their Florida road trip continues. Tipoff is at 6:30 with all the action heard locally on 100.3 FM.