Indiana's Trayce Jackson-Davis, Race Thompson too much for Kent State in NCAA Tournament
ALBANY, NY. — It was a game that former Cavaliers coach John Lucas would love.
Not so much for the Kent State men's basketball team.
Fourth-seeded Indiana staved off the trend of the weekend and beat the 13th-seeded Golden Flashes 71-60 on Friday in a Midwest Regional first-round game.
Only Akron (67-55, Feb. 3) and Ball State (82-70, Feb. 21) gave them worse losses this season.
That’s what happens when you average nearly 6-foot-5 among your starting five.
Kent State (28-7) worried about size and size did it in as Indiana (23-11) altered shots, owned the paint and did pretty much whatever it wanted against the Golden Flashes in front of 13,989 fans at MVP Arena.
"There were certain times when their length impacted shots at the rim," Kent State coach Rob Senderoff said. "There were also times where I felt like we just missed shots that we normally make. Again, Trayce Jackson-Davis had five blocks. His presence down there, I'm sure impacted some of those misses as well."
The Hoosiers will play fifth-seeded Miami (26-7) at 8:40 p.m. Sunday back in MVP Arena.
NCAA Tournament:March Madness | NCAA Tournament live score updates: Kent State vs. Indiana
Indiana basketball:Kent State basketball knows it must deal with Indiana's Trayce Jackson-Davis, Jalen Hood Schifino
Trayce Jackson-Davis went off for Indiana and Kent State couldn't keep up
All-American forward Jackson-Davis (24 points, 11 rebounds, five assists, five blocks), Race Thompson (20 points, nine rebounds) and Miller Kopp (13 points, five rebounds) led the way for Indiana.
"We knew going in that we were a little bit bigger than Kent State," Indiana coach Mike Woodson said. "I thought our game plan offensively was go to inside. That's where we've been pretty good all season. I thought it was a total team effort against this team because they could really score the basketball."
So could Jackson-Davis, who took over in the second half after a slow start by his standards.
The senior scored 14 points, grabbed four rebounds and an assist after the break to show why he's in the conversation for NCAA Player of the Year.
Jalen Sullinger gave Kent State life, Trayce Jackson-Davis pushed Indiana even more after that
When back-to-back 3s by Jalen Sullinger (eight points) cut the Flashes' deficit to eight, Jackson-Davis scored six of the next eight points to push it back out to 62-50 with 7:39 left.
"We picked a bad night to have a bad night," Sullinger said. "... Give credit to them. The big dominated tonight, so props to him."
Sincere Carry (15 points), who was slowed by a thigh injury in shootaround, led the Golden Flashes.
"I don't know if it impacted him or not," Senderoff said. "Looking at the stat sheet, I'd say it probably did, but he played 39 minutes.
"I think I took him out with 57 seconds to go. He would have had to have his leg cut off for him not to play. That's the bottom line."
Chris Payton (10 points, six rebounds), VonCameron Davis (10 points, four rebounds), Chris Payton (10 points, six rebounds) and Malique Jacobs (eight points, nine rebounds, seven assists) were solid in defeat.
"We had 19 offensive rebounds in the game and nine turnovers," Senderoff said. "We played really, really hard. We just didn't play well."
Contact Brad Bournival at bbournival@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter at @bbournival
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: NCAA Tournament ends at one for Kent State in tough game with Indiana
