Takeaways from Troy’s 70-66 loss to South Alabama
The Troy Trojans dropped a home contest with rival South Alabama on Friday night, 70-66, in the first nationally televised home game since 2015.
Troy pulled within one point with 1:01 to go and forced a contested three on the next possession only for the ball to careen into the hands of another Jaguar.
Two USA free throws and a missed step-back three from Ty Gordon later and the Jaguars escaped Troy with a key conference win.
For Troy, the Trojans drop to 5-9 in conference play and remain in 11th place in the Sun Belt.
These are the Trojan Wall’s takeaways from Friday night’s loss.
A big night for Trojan Arena
One of the finest arenas in the Sun Belt rarely gets the crowd it so badly deserves, but for the second time this season the building was jolted with an electrifying energy that lasted throughout the game.
“The fans were great,” Desmond Williams said after the game. “The energy in here was awesome. We appreciate all the fans that come out and we wish they could come out again.”
Unfortunately, it ended in a similar fashion to the first big game of the year against UAB: heartbreakingly. Still, Cross believes Troy never would have even been in a position to win if not for the crowd.
“I don’t think we get the (South Alabama) lead and cut it to one without the crowd,” coach Scott Cross said. “They helped energize our guys.”
The announced attendance for the game was 4,523, second highest of the season behind only the 5,000-plus crowd against UAB.
Troy’s size disadvantage showed up
The Trojans typically see a high volume of three-pointers launched from opposing teams, but it was a different story against a bruising Jaguar team. Troy opponents are taking 41.1 percent of their shots from deep. Only 25.4 percent of USA’s shots came from beyond the arc, though.
Josh Ajayi, a 6-6, 229-pound center, dominated the offensive post throughout the night. The senior scored 20 points and grabbed 10 rebounds in over 35 minutes of action.
“Josh Ajayi is probably the best low-post scorer in the league,” Cross said. “Physically, he’s probably the strongest post player in the league. He gave us fits in the first half. We couldn’t stop him. Nick (Stampley) tried to do a good job but we didn’t do a good enough job giving him help.”
The size disadvantage didn’t leak into the rebounding stats, however. The Jaguars ended up with just a slim 37-35 rebounding lead and won the offensive boards by just one.
The mitigating factor came from Troy’s sixth leading rebounder, guard Tahj Small. The JUCO transfer had eight rebounds on the night to follow up a 10-rebound night against Georgia State.
“(Tahj Small) is surprisingly one of the best rebounders on the team,” Cross said. “He just kind of has a Dennis Rodman-like knack for chasing them down.”
Small is averaging 7.0 rebounds per game over the last five games.
Struggling to break the zone
Troy is already a three-point shooting team, but it was not by choice that the Trojans were forced to live beyond the arc on Friday night. The Jaguars played a tight zone for much of the night, keeping Troy from penetrating the paint.
Over half of Troy’s field goal attempts came from three as the Trojans hit 11 of 36 attempts. The guard trio of Ty Gordon, Darian Adams and Charles Norman combined to hit just four threes in 21 attempts.
“They pack it in,” Cross said. “They do a good job with it. There’s not a whole lot of open areas so you’ve got to hit shots against them.”
The Trojans did have two zone-breakers throughout the night, first was Williams who scored a team-high 14 points and hit four of seven three-point attempts.
“Coach has faith in me when I shoot the ball,” Williams said. “So I know it’s going to go in when I shoot it.”
Nick Stampley, the scorer
The other zone-breaker came up big in the first half. Nick Stampley was able to find empty spots on the blocks throughout the first half.
Stampley has been the prototypical hard-nosed, charge call-drawing forward that illustrates Cross’ toughness-centric style all season long. The junior came into the game averaging just 4.7 points per game in 19.1 minutes but scored 10 points against USA, all in the first half.
“The way (South Alabama) plays their zone they basically leave the five-man open,” Cross said. “Ty (Gordon) did a good job finding him and getting him some open looks.”
Stampley’s biggest bucket came in the final seconds of the first half when the junior hit a shot from the low block to cut the Jaguars lead to single digits before the break.
“Basically, just finding the open spot on the baseline,” Stampley said. “We talked about it in practice this week, (Cross) told me to find that little soft spot.”
The future is bright
While Troy continues to take its lumps now, the Trojans have shown a resiliency against top Sun Belt competition.
“This team fights,” Stampley said. “That’s our identity. We’re fighters.”
For Williams, a freshman, the future could hold some serious hardware.
“The ultimate goal is to win a Sun Belt championship,” Williams. “We say it every day in practice. In the future, I hope that we can win multiple Sun Belt championships.”
The Trojans are heading down the final stretch of the season and have just three home games remaining out of six total. Up next is a matchup with last-placed Louisiana-Monroe next Thursday.