Tyrese Hunter scored 20 points and PJ Haggerty scored 19 points as the No. 21 ranked Memphis Tigers (11-3) started conference play and the 2025 new year with a 90-62 win over the FAU Owls (7-7) in Boca Raton on Thursday night.
Dain Dainja has big second half
All 16 of Dain Dainja’s points came in the second half. Even more impressive, all 16 points came after Dainja had picked up four fouls. Usually, that prevents players from being aggressive, but the 6-foot-9 center from Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, shot 7-of-12 from the field, recording five rebounds, two steals, and one block in just 21 minutes off the bench.
“Dain himself adds a different layer (to Memphis) because he can score the basketball in bunches like he did in the second half,” Memphis coach Penny Hardaway said. Hardaway also added that it’s “A blessing to be able to have Dain Dainja coming off your bench. I mean c’mon. This guy was with Baylor when they won a national championship. He sat there the entire season and watched that. Then at Illinois, he had so much confidence and so much winning there.”
Memphis’ defensive intensity was too much for FAU
Memphis out-rebounded FAU 44-34. Simply put, the Tigers were able to play a physical style of defense while maintaining form on offense.
“A commitment to being disruptive,” Memphis coach Penny Hardaway said when asked how his team consistently shows intensity on defense. “It starts at practice, and we are able to carry it over. That’s who we are. We are Memphis basketball. We are disruptive. We are going to change defenses. We are going to try to do things to get you off-balanced. We have been doing a great job with that.”
FAU couldn’t get shots to fall
FAU shot a season-worst 32.4% from the field, including an abysmal 28.6% in the second half. The Owls shot just 16.1% from three, making 5-of-31 shots from downtown on their home court. Memphis’ defense had a lot to do with that, but FAU also missed a lot of wide open shots.
“Of our 31 threes, 18 of them were wide open,” FAU coach John Jakus said. “We missed 14 of the 18 wide open threes. We lost by a bunch tonight and I’ll take the blame for that. That’s my job. We have to be better. But if you get 18 wide open ones against a team as good as Memphis, at a certain point you’ve got to live. And we’ll live with it and we’ll get better. A lot of it is on me and I’ll take the blame.”
FAU came in 26th in the country in points per game (84.8). They scored just 62 points, which is the second-lowest mark they’ve hit this season (FAU scored 61 points against Seton Hall). FAU also came in 12th in the nation in bench points (35.7), but only recorded 21 in Thursday’s contest.
“The lack of ball reversal and paint touch is where we break down.” Jakus said. He also added, “When we play defense against a top 25 team, we really exert our legs. We extend the energy that it takes to offense rebound. Our jump shots go away. Conditioning to do both at the same day at the same time has hit us three or four times… Seton Hall, Michigan State, and then tonight. When we exert ourselves on the glass and then turn people over, the jumpshot goes away. We are going to have to grow in the ability to do both on the same day.”
What went well for FAU
FAU recorded a season-high 19 offensive rebounds. They also forced 19 turnovers.
“I thought we did a good job in our margins,” Jakus said. “We were really concerned about offensive rebounding. We were +6. We were concerned about the turnover battle because they press so much. We were +6 there. So to be +12 at home and actually shoot more free throws than a team that has Haggerty on it that shoots so many free throws and lose is painful. A lot of pain is found in the way we shot the basketball.”
“I thought when we let it get above double digits pretty early on, we won the first half 30-28 after that first media timeout. It was because we were able to convert some of those turnovers. When you turnover a really good basketball team, which to me has one of the best three-headed monster guard combinations in the country, 19 times… I didn’t know coming in that with those three guards we can turn them over 19 times.”
Memphis’ three-headed monster (Haggerty, Hunter, and Colby Rogers) all played over 30 minutes, combining for 50 points on 19-of-34 shooting.
Penny Hardaway comments on FAU
Hardaway mentions a lack of a go-to scorer as one of the main differences between this FAU team and the ones he faced in the last three matchups.
“I respect everybody on this stat sheet, but I think the biggest thing is it’s a totally different coaching staff,” Hardaway said. “It’s totally different systems, totally different players. The previous teams that we played, they had go-to guys that they can give the ball to and get a basket whenever they wanted. Right now, this team is learning… this team is going to be really scary if they can keep this group together and just keep adding pieces.”
Other Notes
- Memphis won its sixth AAC opener in seven years under coach Penny Hardaway.
- Haggerty is now just 20 points away from 1,000 for his career. He is averaging 22.1 PPG this season which ranks seventh in the country. He is the only player in the country averaging at least 22.0 PPG, 5.0 RPG, 3.0 APG, and 2.0 SPG.
- Haggerty has scored 16 or more points in 12 of Memphis’ 14 games.
- Hunter has scored at least 19 points in seven of 14 games.
- This was just the second time ever that a ranked team came to Boca to face off against FAU. The last time FAU welcomed a ranked team to campus was in 1997 when the Owls welcomed No. 25 Charleston.
- Memphis is 7-1 on the season when playing away from home.
- Memphis now has nine combined quad one and quad two wins this season. That’s the most in the country.
- FAU is now 33-3 at home dating back to March of 2022.
Next Up
FAU will be back in action on Sunday, Jan. 5 when the Owls travel to Minges Coliseum to face the Eastern Carolina Pirates (8-6). Tip-off is at 1:00 PM with the game airing on ESPN2.
Memphis, meanwhile, will host North Texas on Sunday at 5:00 PM.
“I respect, unlike the nation, every team in this league (the AAC),” Hardaway said about keeping their pedal on the gas. “North Texas is a good team. They are well coached. They hold you under 60 points. They play extremely hard. I saw them come back from 17 points down at home to UAB and beat those guys. My biggest thing is that when I first got in this league, Houston and Cincinnati were the big dogs. And the way that they carried themselves in this league is every single game was all out pressure everyday. That’s what we are trying to do. We’ve learned from those guys.”