Dain Dainja registered a double-double with 22 points and 12 rebounds, and No. 16 Memphis pulled away for an 84-72 win over UAB to win the American Athletic Conference tournament on Sunday afternoon in Fort Worth, Texas.
PJ Haggerty scored a team-high 23 points for top-seeded Memphis (29-5), which secured an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. Colby Rogers added 15 points.
Yaxel Lendeborg scored 19 points and pulled down 17 rebounds to lead third-seeded UAB (22-12). Efrem Johnson finished with 17 points to go along with six rebounds.
Memphis reached the NCAA Tournament for the third time in the past four seasons under head coach Penny Hardaway. The Tigers have won their most games since the 2012-13 season, when the team posted a 31-5 record.
Memphis coach Penny Hardaway said it was important for his team to win the conference tournament after claiming its regular-season crown.
“It was personal for us to come in and handle our second goal, which was to win the conference championship,” Hardaway said. “We don’t want to leave anything on the table that we have an opportunity to win.
“We’ll never, as long as I’m the coach here, we’ll never look at a tournament as just something to do just to get to the next thing. It will always be the focus of understanding that you respect everything, but you go hard and you try to win everything and that’s what they gave me today. We wanted it for our city, for our university, and for ourselves, and it’s a great feeling to have done so.”
The Tigers shot 47.1 percent (32 of 68) overall and 46.2 percent (6 of 13) from 3-point range. UAB shot 34.8 percent (24 of 69) from the field and 25.9 percent (7 of 27) from long distance.
The Blazers pulled within 63-61 with 7:17 left. Johnson grabbed a defensive rebound, and UAB capitalized on the other end of the court with a layup by Christian Coleman.
Memphis responded with an 8-0 run to seize a 71-61 advantage with 5:27 remaining. Moussa Cisse tipped in a shot to start the run, which also included a layup by Haggerty, two free throws by Rogers and a layup by Dainja.
The Blazers struggled to keep pace the rest of the way.
UAB held a 35-32 lead at the half.
Memphis jumped to a 10-5 lead in the first four minutes. Nicholas Jourdain made a dunk and Rogers made a layup on back-to-back possessions to punctuate the early run.
UAB responded with a 12-4 run to grab a 17-14 lead with 12:19 to go in the first half. Lendeborg drained a 3-pointer off a pass from Tyren Moore to finish the run.
The Blazers built their lead to 35-30 on a jump shot by Johnson with 49 seconds remaining in the half.
Haggerty finished the first-half scoring with a pair of free throws to cut the deficit to three.
Cisse said winning the AAC tourney and advancing to the NCAA Tournament fulfilled a dream.
“We don’t take it for granted,” the center said. “It is a great feeling. For me, this is my first year in the tournament, so I’m going to give it everything that I got because I’m not going to take it for granted. So, yeah, I’m really happy about this.”
–Field Level Media
