SMU Routs Hofstra
DALLAS (AP) — Cannen Cunningham had 14 points with several highlight dunks and SMU won for the second time in two days, beating Hofstra 73-49 in a makeup game Sunday night.
SMU (14-4) led throughout after scoring the game’s first six points.
Cunningham had three powerful dunks in the first 6 1/2 minutes after halftime, the last in that span for a 46-24 SMU lead.
Markus Kennedy had 12 points and 12 rebounds for the Mustangs, who are already within one of matching last season’s victory total in Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown’s debut on the Hilltop. Nic Moore had 10 points and seven assists, while Ben Moore had 10 points.
Hofstra (6-12) was originally supposed to play SMU on Dec. 7, a game to be played in the Dallas suburb of Frisco that was postponed when the Pride’s flight to Dallas was canceled due to icy weather in North Texas.
The later date allowed the makeup to be played in the newly renovated
Moody Coliseum on the SMU campus. It was the Mustangs’ third game in their new building this month and they’ve won all of them.
SMU was on the road for its American Athletic Conference game Saturday, a 58-46 victory at UCF. The Mustangs play their third game in four days Tuesday night when they host Rutgers in another conference game.
Hofstra didn’t have another game this weekend, but shot a season-low 33 percent (16 of 48) from the field.
Chris Jenkins had 14 points for Hofstra, while Dion Nesmith had 11 and Zeke Upshaw had 10 on 3-of-14 shooting. Upshaw was coming off a 27-point game when he tied a team record with seven 3-pointers.
Cunningham’s breakaway slam on a half-court pass from Ryan Manuel put SMU up 24-14 with 7:48 left in the first half.
The Mustangs stretched the lead to 33-18 by halftime even with only one more field goal in that stretch, Ben Moore’s layup with 1:06 left.
Hofstra never got closer after halftime, when the Mustangs put on quite a rim-rattling show.
Russell had an alley-oop pass to Cunningham for the first dunk, then to Kennedy for another slam. Nic Moore made an alley-oop pass for another dunk by Cunningham, whose last slam in that spurt was after a more traditional pass from Russell.
Even when the high-arching pass from Russell wasn’t quite where it needed to be, Manuel managed to tip in a basket that hit a couple of sides of the rim before falling. And Cunningham wasn’t finished, with a breakaway one-handed slam that made it 66-34 with 7 1/2 minutes left.
The Mustangs are back in action Tuesday night (Jan. 21) when they host Rutgers at Moody Coliseum. Tipoff is slated for 7:00 p.m. and tickets can be purchased online at smumustangs.com/tickets.
