After a relatively quiet first half, IU’s offense came alive in the second half as the Hoosiers defeated Grand Canyon, 94-66.
Freshman guard James Blackmon Jr. snapped out of a personal shooting slump to start the second half, giving IU seven of its first 10 points.
Blackmon finished with a team-high 18 points off of 7-of-14 shooting. Sophomore forward Troy Williams had 14 points.
IU opened the second half strong despite the absence of Ferrell who sat out for nearly six minutes due to foul trouble. It didn’t hurt IU much. The Hoosiers outscored the Antelopes 15-7 in his absence.
IU had a relatively contained first half that saw the Hoosiers shoot just 37.5 percent from the floor. IU built an 11-point halftime lead with some hot shooting from beyond the arc in the opening period.
After missing its first three 3-point attempts, IU converted on five of its next six 3-point attempts to go up 25-11 just under halfway through the opening period.
The lead against Grand Canyon eroded a bit after that, getting as low as eight points with under two minutes left in the half before sophomore guard Collin Hartman hit a 3-pointer to make it 11-29 to force a Grand Canyon timeout with 1:29 left in the half.
IU had 24 rebounds, including 11 offensive boards, in the game’s first 12 minutes. IU’s 12 offensive rebounds against Grand Canyon in that span was more than the Hoosiers managed the entire game against Louisville on Tuesday.
The only problem for IU was that it turned those 11 offensive rebounds into just four second-chance points.
IU finished the game outrebounding Grand Canyon 52-35 and only turned the ball over four times. The Hoosiers largest lead of the night was 31.
Sam Beishuizen
