Jaguar men lose third straight, drop to 0-2 in PBC; Gardner has 27
Justin Gray | Sports editor
The new year hasn’t been nice to the Jaguars so far, and it wasn’t any nicer Jan. 6 as the AU men fell 91-87 in overtime at the hands of Columbus State University (8-3).
The Jaguars came into this one with aspirations of getting their first Peach Belt Conference win, but it will have to wait, although they had a valiant comeback that just came up short.
It was a slow start for Augusta (0-2, 7-5), which has seemed to be a recurring theme to this season. The Jaguars, who have lost three straight, found themselves down 5-0 early.
They settled in and started scoring well, even taking several leads in the first half. A late CSU run gave the Cougars a 41-37 at the break.
After the half, it became a physical game with not many fouls called. Augusta dominated the paint, but Columbus State stayed ahead by knocking it down from behind the arc, even extending its lead to nine points.
The Jaguars battled back, as they have all year, and tied it at 72. With 30 seconds left on the clock, CSU’s Wisdom Uboh took a 75-72 lead on a 3-pointer.
The Jags set up a play to get the ball to their steady hand, David Viti, who knocked down a deep 3-pointer to tie the game. There was time left on the clock, but neither team could get a shot off and we were headed to overtime.
It seemed as if the Jaguars had the momentum, but couldn’t keep it as CSU was just too resilient and came away with the win.
This drops the Jaguars to 0-2 in the conference for the first time since the 2016-17 season.
It was another outstanding offensive performance from AU’s Demitri Gardner, who had 27 points, five rebounds and four assists. This is not something new from the sophomore, who is the leading scorer on the team at 16.7 points per game.
“I’m just trying to do whatever I need to do to help my team win,” said the shooting guard from Winchester, Va.
Per usual, the Jaguars had two guys with double-doubles, Max Amadasun (15 points & 14 rebounds) and Ja’Queze Kirby (13 points and 10 rebounds).
Kirby seems to be playing his best basketball of the year season his career high 30 points in the previous contest and this performance tonight.
“I feel like I’m getting back into playing my best basketball; it’s coming, as I just haven’t put it all together yet,” said the Junior from Hazlehurst. “For us to win these close games, I believe we have to be disciplined and do what we know to do in those types of situations.”
Viti followed their performance with 14 points of his own, and John St. Germain III had 11 points off the bench.
AU Coach Dip Metress knows his team can improve going forward.
“Tonight we played the right way for the most part offensively,” said Metress. “We made an adjustment to some things and that helped us. We will continue to have to improve on the defensive end of the floor.”
Columbus State was led by Uboh, who had 25 points. CSU had four players in double digits.
Earlier, the AU women defeated CSU by a 67-57 score. Autumn Phillips led the Jaguars (2-0, 8-4) with 19 points, followed by Brianna Meekins with 17. Meekins made 7 of 9 from the field. AU won it at the line, making 18 of 23 from the stripe.
AU is in a three-way tie with North Georgia and Lander for first place in the PBC.
The Jaguar men will look to get back in the win column as they have their Peach Belt home opener against Clayton State (1-1, 5-7) on Wednesday, Jan. 10, at 7:30 p.m. The AU women start things off with a 5:30 start against the Laker women (1-1, 3-8).
Contact Justin Gray at jusgray@augusta.edu.
The Jags’ David Viti (shooting) hit a big 3-pointer late to send the game with Columbus State to overtime. At the top of the page, Demitri Gardner had 27 points to lead AU against the Cougars. (photos by Paula Toole, AU Athletics)
