By: By Brandon Scardigli
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KENNESAW, Ga. – In its first opportunity to take the floor in the 2013-14 campaign, the Kennesaw State men's basketball team took care of business on its home court, defeating Covenant College 95-66 in the first of two exhibition contests for KSU on Saturday night.
The Owls were led by senior
Drew McGhee, who netted 13 points to go with his game-high nine rebounds during the route of the Scots.
"We came out in the first 10 minutes and played KSU basketball," Kennesaw State head coach
Lewis Preston said. "We were aggressive, sound and loud. But once we built our lead we got out of our system a bit. Our bigs played in an adverse situation for them, going against a smaller team like Covenant, but all-in-all we took a lot of positives to build on. We saw a lot of good things and some stuff that we know we want to get better at."
KSU put together a solid first five minutes, going up on Covenant 10-0 with six of those points coming from sophomore
Orlando Coleman. The Owls held the Scots scoreless up until the 16:33 mark of the first half and didn't allow Covenant to hit double figures until the clock hit 10:49.
With just over a minute to go in the first it was the senior
Andrew Osemhen who gave the Owls their biggest lead of the half at 41-22 on a layup. KSU went on to end the first 20 minutes of action with the 41-25 lead after shooting 47-percent from the field.
After taking the 16-point lead into the second half, Covenant fought back, cutting the KSU lead down to just four points within six minutes after starting off the period on a 13-2 run. But a three-pointer from
Yonel Brown and a basket from
Myles Hamilton put KSU back up by nine with 15:11 to go.
The Owls regained their double-digit lead at 12:35 on a Brown free throw, 53-43, with McGhee hitting a layup to put KSU up by 12 shortly thereafter. Kennesaw State then cruised in the final portions of the second half, going up by 20 on a Coleman field goal and earning the 30 point-edge on a
Jordan Jones freebie as the Owls eased to the 95-66 win.
KSU put five players in double-figures scoring, led by Coleman and Osemhen's 15 and followed by 13 from McGhee, 12 from
Bernard Morena and 11 from Brown. As a team, the Owls shot 51-percent from the field for the ballgame.
On the boards, every Owl that entered the game grabbed at least one rebound with McGhee leading the way with his nine followed by eight from
Willy Kouassi.
The point guard Brown dished out four assists as the Owls put up 56 of their 95 total points in the paint to go with 47 points from the bench.
KSU will be back on the court for its final tune-up contest before the regular season, taking on Piedmont College at 7 p.m. ET on Monday, Nov. 4.
To keep up with the latest Kennesaw State men's basketball news follow the team on Twitter
@KSUOwlNation and
@KSUOwlsMBB or by liking Kennesaw State University on
Facebook.
Season tickets are currently available for all the home court action for the Owls and can be purchased by following the link here.
-#GoKSUOwls-
