Waves overcome Pirates

by Bobby Abplanalp
Wyoming Sports.org

The Pepperdine Waves won the opening game of the World Vision Challenge, which is hosted by the University of Wyoming, pulling away from the Hampton Pirates 75-66 Friday evening at the Arena-Auditorium in Laramie.

Pepperdine, of the West Coast Conference, is now 2-3 on the season and will move on to play the Monmouth Hawks on Saturday.

Hampton, from the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, has yet to win a game this season and now sits at 0-5.

Shooting guard Dane Suttle Jr. led all scorers with 22 points and scored 18 of those in the first half. The Waves led 31-28 at the break.

Pepperdine toughened up its defense and was able to get inside easier for high-percentage shots in the second half to essentially pull away from the Pirates and led by as many as 11 points.

“The game plan in the second half was to come out and play hard and try to maintain the lead,” Suttle Jr. said. “We played zone (defense) pretty good in the first half. We just wanted to go hard and lock up on defense and crash the boards. I thought we did that in the second half.”

Pepperdine head coach and former Wyoming standout Tom Asbury was pleased to come back to Laramie and get a win.

“It’s fun to come back, it brings back a million memories,” Asbury said. “It’s kind of another home for me. Coaches live a lot of places, but this is a home away from home for me. It’s good to be back, we’re going to be here for three days and going to enjoy looking around for a little bit.”

After relying on the outside shot in the first half, the Waves went inside in the second half.

“We relied too much on the perimeter game in the first half and our post guys weren’t scoring much," Asbury said. "Once we started dribble penetrating and getting to the foul line and getting the ball to the bigs, it worked a little bit better and then we turned the ball over so much too, we just kept shooting ourselves in the foot in the first half and enabled them to stay around and stay in the game.”

Hampton was led by Michael Freeman and Darrion Pellum with 16 points each.

"We struggled in the second half and couldn't put an entire game together," Hampton coach Edward Joyner Jr. said. "We just didn't play well in the second half, that was plain to see."