By Tim Daniel
(photo courtesy of Desmond Fischer of Xavier Newswire)
The Cintas Center was loud, rocking, and full of energy tonight as the Musketeers welcomed a crowd back home. Not only was the crowd clicking on all cylinders tonight, but the home team also responded with a very impressive performance defeating Ferris St 100-59 and holding their opponent to just 24.6% from the field.
Behind senior leader Paul Scruggs, Xavier was off and running with 25 fast-break points and 46 points in the paint. Adam Kunkel was the team leader in scoring with 21 points while shooting 4/7 from long range and contributed to the Musketeers' great shooting at the line making all three of his attempts.
Sophomores Colby Jones and Dwon Odom added some very impressive dunks on alley-oops and also transfer Jerome Hunter put his stamp on the athleticism of the team with an impressive coast-to-coast dunk as well.
One thing that stood out through the game was the Depth of the Musketeers. Their bench unit scored 56 of the teams 100 points. The big men of the Musketeers each had their moments including Dieonte Miles making the start and scoring the games first basket on a put-back, freshman Cesare Edwards picked up seven rebounds and had a really nice basket at the top of the key.
In years past this Xavier team has struggled from the free-throw line but tonight the team shot 26/31 from the stripe coming in at an impressive 84%.
Up next for the Musketeers, the regular season begins on Tuesday night with a matchup against Niagra. Tip-off is at 7:30 PM and starts a four-game homestand for the team.
