Thompson dominates Tigers
By Keith Henry

It was the Kevin Thompson show at Hill Field House last night. Thompson’s career highs of 23 points and 25 rebounds helped the Morgan State Bears overcome an early deficit to defeat the Towson Tigers 87-80.

Morgan State head coach Todd Bozeman said, “(Kevin) was huge. We like to try to get those kinds of efforts out of Kevin every night. He’s been rebounding all year. So you win games with defense and rebounding and Kevin has been a yeoman on the boards. I’m trying to get him some help. If he could play some defense and bring a little more energy, it’s no telling what he could do.”

Morgan started off rough and was trailing 27-14 with 9:18 left due to numerous Towson three-pointers. Most of those were from Towson senior guard Josh Thornton, who made five of his seven first half three-point attempts. Thornton scored 18 of his 21 points in the first half. Towson head coach Pat Kennedy said, “Josh is an outstanding shooter. He is one of the best three point shooters in the country. He shoots almost 45% and is a better three-point shooter than he is a two-point shooter. (Morgan State) did a good job kind of pushing up on him as the game went on.”

But the play of Kevin Thompson helped bring Morgan State back. The Bears (7-4) outscored Towson 18-2 during a 3½ minute stretch to take a 32-29 lead with 5:47 left.

MSU pushed up the energy defensively late in the first half by limiting Towson (4-5) to six points for the rest of the half. As a result, the Bears pushed their lead to 46-35 at halftime. Thompson has recorded a double-double already with 15 points and 13 rebounds at the half. Morgan State out-rebounded the Tigers 29-12 at the half as well. Thompson said about that run, “My teammates see how much energy I was bringing to grabbing rebounds and scoring. I guess I brought them along and they just started playing.”

Kennedy said about Thompson, “He’s terrific. I love Kevin. He’s big and strong and he positions himself really well. He was very, very thick and makes some really good plays around the basket. I thought our big guys played really well. We’ve got to work a little bit better on how we’re going to guard a guy like that with that size and girth because he moved us around quite a bit.”

Towson got back into the game in the second half due to the shot blocking abilities of forwards Robert Nwankwo and Calvin Lee at Morgan’s expense. Both of those players combined for 11 blocked shots on the night. The Tigers pushed within 80-78 on a Troy Franklin lay-up with 55 seconds left. But MSU responded when Reggie Holmes was fouled on a lay-up attempt and converted two clutch free throws with 49 seconds left.

Towson didn’t help themselves down the stretch when they missed several lay-up attempts in the closing minutes. Morgan State put the Tigers away when off a missed lay-up from Nwankwo; Smith fed DeWayne Jackson who streaked down the floor for a one handed slam while he was fouled by Towson’s RaShawn Polk with 31 seconds left. Jackson converted the free throw to push the lead to 85-78.