HOUSTON – The Texas Southern Tigers advanced to the 2017 SWAC Tournament Championship with a 62-57 win over the Grambling State Tigers on Friday at the Toyota Center.
Led by guard Jalan McCloud who poured in 17 points, 6 rebounds, and 4 steals the Tigers withheld a furious GSU rally in the second half to claim a hard fought victory.
Trae Jefferson contributed 14 points for the Tigers along with 4 assists, and 4 rebounds. The Tigers shot 43 percent from the floor for the game while playing stifling defense on the other end of the floor holding GSU to shooting just 33 percent.
“Like I’ve mentioned before on several occasions this team has a lot of talent,” said TSU head coach Mike Davis. “On any given night we have four to five players that can go out and score the basketball at a high level.”
TSU had a balanced scoring attack versus Grambling State with a total of seven players scoring points. Marvin Jones and Kevin Scott led the charge on the glass tallying 11 and 10 rebounds respectively.
“We’ve yet to put together a complete game on both ends of the floor,” said Davis. “And that’s the really scary part about this team, the fact that we’ve won 22 games and really haven’t played our best basketball up to this point.”
The Tigers will get a chance to bring home another SWAC Title on Saturday at 5:30 pm as TSU will face the Alcorn State Braves. Regardless of the outcome of the game TSU has punched its tickets to the 2017 NCAA Tournament as Alcorn State is ineligible for postseason play.
Courtesy: TSU Athletics
