USF cruises past DePaul, up to third-place in Big East

The USF men’s basketball team finally took its show on the road Sunday.

The Bulls played a road gamewith the same intensity seen athome in impressive wins overSeton Hall and St. John’s,taking down DePaul 75-59 to notch their second road win ofthe season.

The victory brought the Bullsto 12-8 on the season and 5-2 inthe Big East, as well as into a tie forthird place in the conference.

Up eight points after a laterun in the first half, USF foughtoff a Blue Demons rally at the13:00 mark of the second half,which saw its eight-pointadvantage shrunk to two multipletimes. At that point, the Bullswent on a 6-0 run, takingadvantage of DePaul’s strugglesshooting from the floor, andafter getting the lead back toeight, they refused to look back.

Augustus Gilchrist scored aseason-high 22 points andgrabbed five rebounds, shooting7-of-8 from the field,8-of-10 from the free-throw lineand scoring 14 of his points in the second half. His performance was a marked improvementfrom his game Wednesday night against St. John’s, when hestruggled to four points, all from the free-throw line, and justone rebound.

Jawanza Poland providedvaluable scoring off thebench, scoring 19 points on 8-of-13 shooting, despite beingin foul trouble for the majorityof the second half.

Cleveland Melvin and Jamee Crockett of DePaul combined for 32 points, but the BlueDemons shot just 33 percentfrom the field – with a large part of the blame going toMoses Morgan and BrandonYoung, who combined toshoot 1-of-23 and 0-for-11 from 3-point range.

Once again, USF’s size and length provided trouble forits opponent, as the Bullsout-rebounded the BlueDemons 38-24, an advantage that fueled the Bulls to victorydespite having five moreturnovers than the BlueDemons.

The margin of victory,16 points, is the third highestever in Big East play for the Bulls,following their 17-point victoryover Villanova earlier this seasonand a 22-point victory overDePaul in 2009.

This season also marks thefirst time since joining the Big East in 2006 that USF has three separate conferencevictories by 15 points or more, with all three of the victoriescoming in the last three weeks.

USF will now stay on theroad, traveling to Milwaukee for a Tuesday night date withNo. 21 Marquette.