MU men's hoops vs. Loyola Marymount game story for Monday Press

By TONY GRAHAM
STAFF WRITER

WEST LONG BRANCH - Jhamar Youngblood of the Monmouth University men's
basketball team roared towards the basket as Loyola Marymount defenders
swarmed in his direction.
Displaying inherent point guard instincts the freshman whipped the ball
to the left wing where a wide open Whitney Coleman swished a three.
"Even in practice we've been sharing the ball and everything is just
carrying over,'' said Youngblood after the Hawks buried Loyola's
wounded Lions 81-53 in the non-conference season finale for Monmouth (5-8)
before 1,500 fans at Boylan
Gym.
Loyola Marymount (8-8) played without its two top scorers, 6-2 senior
Brandon Worthy (season ending ACL injury), a 1,200 career point scorer
who was the No. 2 scorer
in the West Coast Conference (18.5 ppg.) and No.
5 WCC scorer, 6-8 senior Matthew Knight (17.5 ppg., strained knee).
"It really didn't matter to me if they had all their starting five out or
one guy out,'' said Youngblood. ""We were going to go out and it was going to
be the same thing.''
""Watching them on tape they're definitely a much different team than they
were with those guys, especially on the offensive end,'' said Dave Calloway,
Monmouth coach. ""I think that was the
biggest thing that hurt them,.
""But I would also like to think our defense had a little something to do
with that as well.''
""In the games we were losing, everybody wasn't playing as a team,''said
Youngblood. ""But now wer're starting to jell as a team and we're getting
victories on both sides of the court, offense and defense.''
Youngblood tied his career high with 20 points and established career
marks with
six assists and five steals, had just one turnover over, and nabbed six
rebounds.
The Youngblood/Coleman back court combined for 13 assists and two turnovers.

After Loyola Marymount (8-8) whittled a 12-point Monmouth advantage to 33-
31 at the
outset of the second half, Monmouth took off.
The Hawks, featuring back-to-back transition dunks by Dejan Delic (17 points) and
Coleman went on a
dazzling 24-0 run.
Monmouth led 57-31 on a layup by
Alex Nunner with 10:32 remaining to clinch its second win in
nine attempts and first since 1990 over a WCC team.
""I just remembered, there would be a media time out, I would just keep looking (at
the scoreboard) and they still had 31 points,'' said Coleman who added 15
points and tied his career high with seven assists.
""I would just be like, ""Let's just crush their confidence, let's keep playing hard, keep
talking on defense, and just keep them where they were at,' ''' said Coleman.
The lead eventually swelled 81-47 on a layup by Shawn Barlow with 1:40
showing.
Monmouth returns to NEC action
on for the balance of the
season 7 p.m. Thursday when it hosts Wagner.
""Momentum is huge in college basketball,''said Coleman. "'We're on a huge
rise including the Stockton (exhibtion) game, we won that big. Now it's big
for confidence.
""I think we've found an idenity as team we didn't have at thd start of
the season.''


Momouth began the game shooting incredibly well, mixing cuts to the basket
with some accurate outside marksmanship.
It hit 10 of its first 13 shots and led 26-14 after Corey Hallett
found a cutting Youngblood. It's marskmanship peaked at 12-for-17 and its lead
held at 31-19 after Marques Alston stroked a 3 from the right corner with five minutes
left in the half.
But then the offensive flow waned as Monmouh failed on its next eight
possessions and missed its next six shot attempts.
Led by nine points by Boston College transfer Adoyah Miller (team high
14) LMU
closed within 31-28 before Youngblood
capped the Hawks' final posession of the half with a layup for a 33-28
advantage.
Monmouth ended the half 13-for-24 (54.2 percent form the floor), had 10n
assists,and seven turnovers, but was utrebounded 19-12. LMU, however,
had just two assists and nine turnovers.
Youngblood's 12 points and eight by Delic led the Monmouth attack.
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