The Xavier Musketeers looked like they were on vacation in the Caribbean in its first game of the 2019-2020 season. It was like a day at the beach at least for the first half.
The Xavier Musketeers had little trouble winning its 20th straight season opener at the Cintas Center with a 76-57 runaway victory over the Jacksonville Dolphins.
"We played really hard from the jump," coach Travis Steele said. "We were kind of complacent for a couple minutes in the second half. We turned it back up though. You can't take any plays off in our league. Overall, we had good effort."
Xavier ranked 19th in the Associated Press initial poll, was able to ease Jason Carter into action. Carter, a transfer from Ohio University battled injuries during the preseason after earning respect on the Musketeers trip to Spain over the summer.
"Jason only practiced twice," Steele said. "He was pretty good tonight, not a good as he was this summer. We got him some time and he looked good."
Seniors Naji Marshall 17, Tyrique Jones 17 and Paule Scruggs 12 handled the scoring. Freshman Zach Freemantle added 11 for the Musketeers. Tyrique Jones and Dahmir Bishop controlled the boards with 11 and seven rebounds, respectively.
"I give Xavier a lot of credit. He has his players playing hard, Jacksonville coach Tony Jasick said.. They're very physical defensively. We didn't handle that very well in the first half. We dug ourselves a hole because of it."
Xavier raced out to a 43-22 halftime lead, closing with an 8-0 run in the last two minutes.
Paul Scruggs had 12 points at the half and Tryrique Jones contributed 10 points. Aamahne Santos had nine points for the Dolphins.
Santos finished with 15 for Jacksonville, tying Bryce Workman for the team lead. Workman led the Dolphins with eight rebounds.
Jacksonville came back in the second half, outscoring the Musketeers 35-33 as Xavier worked on new combinations getting Bishop and Bryce Moore into the mix.
"We have a lot of new guys (nine newcomers)," Jasick said. "Obviously we're playing against a team that has a lot of accolades early in the year. I think we settled in a little bit. We finished some possessions defensively in the second half. We would guard and then foul at the end of possessions. In the second half, we finished more possessions with rebounds that allowed us to play with a little better pace and flow on the offensive end."
"Their were a lot of challenges in this game for us. Obviously putting a new group together, playing against Travis and his group in this environment, there were a lot of challenges but that's why we do it. We can see where the team is at. We found a lot of good things that we can take a handful of good things out of this game."
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