As the old saying goes, offense wins games and defense wins championships. Against the Royal Ambassadors, the Coahoma College Tigers unleashed a devastating supply of both.
The 49-point margin of victory was easily the largest of the year for the Tigers, who have significantly improved their scoring over the last few weeks. Quan Brown, the team’s leading scorer, notched a 28-point, 15-rebound, and 10-assist performance that gave him a coveted triple-double on the stats sheet.
To fully understand this blowout win, let’s look at this game by the numbers.
21
The Coahoma College Tigers had a whopping 21 steals in the win over the Royal Ambassadors. To put this in perspective, LSU leads all Division-I teams with an average of 12.5 steals per game. While it requires offense to score 111 points, 21 steals certainly played a role.
7
Staying on the subject of defense, seven different players had at least one steal. Four players had at least three steals. This is seriously good defense.
54
Coach George Raveling often said that “Rebounding comes down to one basic fact: How much do you want the basketball?” Apparently, the Tigers wanted that basketball because they seized it 54 times.
50
Fifty percent from the free-throw line was no big deal during the blowout, but it might come back and bite the Tigers if that number reappears in a close game.
27
Their 27 offensive rebounds may have been even more impressive than the overall rebound total. Interestingly, their 54 rebounds were split evenly with 27 offensive and 27 defensive boards.
8
All eight Tigers who played scored at least six points, and five of them put up double-figure point totals.
46
The Tigers shot 46 percent from the field. That’s not exactly in the range of Villanova over Georgetown in 1985, but when a team puts up 111 points, it’s hard to complain. Plus 27 offensive rebounds make up for a multitude of sins, so the obvious hard work and desire of the Tigers outweighs field goal percentage.
9
The nine blocked shots were a great compliment to the steals and rebounds. This team is playing hard-nosed, aggressive basketball.
