North Florida handles Austin Peay despite Chris Horton's monster game, wins 80-70

Despite not shooting lights out for most of the game, the University of North Florida Ospreys ran out to a quick lead against an overmatched Austin Peay Governors team and won comfortably 80-70.

The Ospreys had a comfortable lead for the final minutes of the first half and most of the second half, before the Governors whittled it down a bit at the very end. So don't let that score fool you, UNF was never in jeopardy of losing.

In the early going, both teams played inside-out. UNF had advantage at guards and on wing. UNF went to Chris Davenport down low while the Governors went to Chris Horton. Davenport scored 8 of the Ospreys' first 20 points and Horton netted 10 of the Governors first 18.

Horton had himself a night with 28 points and 17 rebounds (10 of the offensive variety) in what was another high-energy game for the big man, despite the fact that his influence was limited in the halfcourt against the zone. To his own credit Horton was able to make some things happen on the offensive boards and was able to score in the second half.

The Ospreys finished shooting about 50 percent from the floor with Davenport leading the team in scoring with 18. Dallas Moore put up 12 points and dished out 8 assists in the win, while Trent Mackey and Beau Beech each added double-digit scoring totals (15 and 14 respectively).

After Horton's hot start in which he played to his preferences with his back to the basket, UNF came out in a zone that forced the Govs to move the ball a bit more around the perimeter than they're used to. AP became out of sorts and struggled to hit shot for the latter part of the first half. Austin Peay then came forth with the strategy of "hey, Chris is a pretty good basketball player, let's just force him the ball by throwing it in the general direction of the paint," and that didn't go swimmingly. The Governors were out of rhythm and forcing passes/shots.

Coming in, North Florida had actually made more 3-pointers than Austin Peay had attempted. Both teams were poor from distance for most of the night. Neither team was particularly good until late.. The "Birds of Trey" started 5-25 from distance on the night began to get hot late when they already had a comfortable lead. The final figure of 13-38 isn't telling of the struggles that UNF had for about 75 percent of the game, but it was something to watch the squad heat up when it made 8 of its last 13.

Jared Savage played some nice minutes for the Govs and finished with three 3-pointers on 6 attempts. No Governor other than Horton scored in double figures

Coach Dave Loos' Govs showed a 2-2-1 press that might be interesting to see in OVC play. It was just one way to slow UNF from getting quickly into its offense, but it never mattered too much as UNF played good defense early on and controlled the game.