FORT WAYNE, Ind. (12/1/2022) -- Graduate senior
Antoine Davis broke the Horizon League scoring record in grand fashion with three-straight 3-pointers to push the Titans ahead as the University of Detroit Mercy men's basketball team came back to defeat conference preseason favorite Purdue Fort Wayne, 75-66, on Thursday night.
Davis ended the contest with a game-high 22 points, draining five from deep, and now has 2,919 points, breaking the Horizon League scoring record of 2,914 by Loyola Chicago's Alfredrick Hughes (1981-85) to move to 13th in NCAA history. He also passed J.J. Redick of Duke (2002-06-457) and Iowa's Jordan Bohannon (2016-12-455) to move to third all-time in 3-pointers with 459.
Senior
Gerald Liddell made his Titan debut and posted 16 points and a career-best 16 rebounds. Graduate senior
Damezi Anderson scored 16 points with seven boards and freshman
Isaiah Jones added a season-high 11 points off the bench connecting on 4-of-6 from the field and 3-of-5 from three in the win.
Detroit Mercy (4-4, 1-0 HL) had a double-digit lead at the break, but Purdue Fort Wayne (4-4, 0-1 HL) came back to take the lead on a few occasions, the latest at 58-57 with 3:20 left. That is when Davis struck for back-to-back triples for a 63-58 advantage, the second of which gave him the record with 2:27 remaining. After a Mastodons' bucket, Davis buried another for a 66-60 margin before Anderson came up with an offensive rebound and putback for an eight-point lead, and the Titans never looked back.
Anderson and Liddell hit four of five free throws in the final minute, and off a steal from graduate senior
TJ Moss, Anderson slammed it with time running down to end the game.
Davis also had a team-high four assists, while Liddell added two assists, two steals and a block. Moss finished with eight points, a career-high four steals, three assists and two blocks and Jones grabbed four boards.
The Titans made 24 field goals with half from behind the arc and were 15-of-19 at the free throw line. The defense forced 20 turnovers and held Purdue Fort Wayne to 38.7 % from the field - 30.0% in the first half - and 5-of-23 from three.
The Titans got off to a fast start scoring the first seven points as Anderson hit a three, senior
Jordan Phillips got inside for a basket and Liddell scored. Davis would then hit back-to-back triples for a 13-3 lead just 3:30 into the contest.
Jones' first collegiate basket was a trey that made it 16-5 and another basket by Liddell had the team up 18-5 at the 2:12 mark as the defense held the Mastodons to just 2-of-10 from the field in that span. Detroit Mercy would up its advantage to 13, 22-9, as an offensive rebound from junior
Kyle LeGreair led to a basket from Liddell and Davis went to the rim for another bucket.
Purdue Fort Wayne would chip away and pull within six, but a three from Moss had the team up 34-22 with 1:33 left, and Jones would hit a three with 40 seconds on the clock for a 37-26 lead at the break.
In the second half, Anderson nailed another one from long range for the biggest lead of the day at 40-26, but a 13-2 run by the Mastodons trimmed that to just three, 42-39, at the 14:21 mark. Jones stopped that run with a three, but Purdue Fort Wayne would eventually knot the score at 45-all midway through the period.
Jones gave the Titans the lead back with a basket and the red, white and blue would continue to stay in front until the Mastodons jumped on top, 54-53, with 5:06 left. Moss would put the team in front again with two free throws, 57-56, but the Mastodons scored to take the lead back until Davis started the final offensive surge push with his back-to-back trifectas.
Detroit Mercy will now look to sweep the opening weekend in Horizon League play as it heads to Cleveland State on Saturday. Game time is set for 3:00 p.m.
Game Notes:
- Purdue Fort Wayne leads the series, 4-3, but the Titans are now 1-2 all-time on the road in the match-up
- This is the 44th year of the Horizon League (1979-80) and the 43rd with Detroit Mercy as a member as the Titans are the eldest program in the league
- The red, white and blue are 18-25 all-time in Horizon League openers and 14-29 in Horizon League road openers as they won both for the second year in a row, beating IUPUI last season
- The win was #401 for head coach Mike Davis
- The Titans played without two starters in graduate senior A.J. Oliver and junior Jayden Stone, who were out with an illness
- Detroit Mercy has now connected on double-digit triples in six of their eight games and 23 of the last 38 games dating back to last year
- Davis now has 832 career 20-point games, 26 career 30-point outings and four 40-point contests in 119 games - reaching 17 points in 105 of them
- Davis is now 32 points shy of Danny Manning (Kansas, 1984-88-2,951) for 12th in NCAA history and 81 points away from becoming the 11th player in NCAA history with 3,000 career points and 748 in back of Pete Maravich's NCAA-record 3,667
- Davis has made a three in 114 of his 119 collegiate games with 65 career games with four or more triples, 23 with six or more, 10 games with seven or more, and has thrice connected on 10 in his career, tying a school record as well as breaking a conference tournament record
- Davis' 459 career 3-pointers trail only Oakland's Travis Bader (2010-14-504) and Wofford's Fletcher Magee (2015-19-509) in NCAA history
- Davis now has 504 career assists, 111 in back of the Titans' all-time record of 615 by Kevin McAdoo
- Anderson was back in double figures for the fourth time this season and the first since he had 15 in the win over Ohio
- Anderson's career-high is 17 points in the season opener against Rochester
- Moss also had four steals at Tulsa as a member of South Carolina in 2020
- Liddell's career high in points is 22 against North Carolina Central last season, while his previous high in rebounds was 14 at Alabama A&M last season
- The last Titan with 16 rebounds in a game was Chris Brandon, who had 17 versus Cleveland State on Feb. 15, 2020
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