A triple-double and a lot of offense greeted a crowd of local elementary school students on Wednesday at H.O. Clemmons Arena.
Senior guard Quion Williams earned his first career triple-double in leading the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff men’s basketball team past Champion Christian College 138-73.
“It’s outstanding, because most guys, it’s hard to get a triple-double,” Williams said. “When you get a triple-double with a win, and then I had a couple more guys to have a couple double-doubles, and then to have an outstanding team effort, it felt amazing.”
Williams finished the game with 29 points, 18 assists and 14 rebounds. He had never had more than eight assists in a game in his career, which started at Oklahoma State and Abilene Christian before he signed with UAPB this offseason.
The Jonesboro native had 21 points, 10 assists and five rebounds at halftime. He collected his sixth rebound within the first two minutes of the second half and grabbed two offensive boards in one possession later in the half. He collected his 10th rebound on the defensive end with 7:45 remaining in the game.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
UAPB Coach Solomon Bozeman said Williams is a playmaker and NBA-caliber defender who reminds him of Los Angeles Lakers guard Marcus Smart, a 2014 Boston Celtics first-round draft pick.
“He probably hates when I say that, because he’s Quion Williams, but just to give everybody a comparison, that’s who he reminds me of is Marcus Smart,” Bozeman said. “He does a lot of winning things on the court. He’s came in, he’s changed our whole program as far as our culture, holding guys accountable.”
The Smart comparison is appropriate considering Smart played at Oklahoma State, the school where Williams began his college career.
Williams said Bozeman isn’t the first one to make that comparison.
“I actually know Marcus Smart’s best friend, Phil Forte,” Bozeman said. “I think Coach Forte was the first person to start. He used to tell me I remind him of him, so I just feel like that trickled down to all the other coaches across the country.”
Forte was Smart’s teammate at Oklahoma State and is currently an assistant coach at West Virginia.
Williams wasn’t the only standout player for UAPB (3-10) on Wednesday.
Senior forward Jaquan Scott returned from a one-game absence caused by an ankle injury and led all scorers with 33 points, breaking the season-high 30 he scored two games ago at Tulsa. He also collected 13 rebounds.
Redshirt junior guard Trevon Payton finished one assist short of his own triple-double after scoring 18 points and collecting 11 rebounds. Alex Mirhosseini scored 20 points, Jai’Chaunn Hayes 12, and Ahmad Johnson 11.
The Golden Lions shot 62.1% from the field, made 13 of 29 three-pointers and shot 7 of 10 from the free throw line.
The one thing which went well for the visiting Tigers was their three-point shooting. Champion made 14 of 35 shots from beyond the arc. Junior forward Cade Wilson led Champion with 17 points after making 3 of 4 from three-point range. Senior guard Cam Parker made 4 of 10 and finished with 12 points.
That three-point shooting helped the Tigers build an early 13-9 lead after they made 3 of their first 5, but UAPB went on a 17-0 run afterward to take control.
The Golden Lions went on to lead 67-33 at halftime after a late Williams layup. The score sent the kids in the crowd into a “6-7” frenzy.
That halftime advantage was a big improvement from the 47-38 lead UAPB held at halftime of Monday’s game against Ecclesia College, a team from the National Christian College Athletic Association like Champion.
Bozeman said he liked how much better UAPB played defensively on Wednesday.
“Still thought we came out a little slow the first 2 or 3 minutes, but after we called the timeout, guys’ effort and the way we locked in, the way we were disciplined, we got after it on that defensive end,” Bozeman said. “We started switching everything, and that really caused problems (for Champion).”
The 67-point first half came two days after UAPB scored 67 in the second half of its win against Ecclesia. The Golden Lions one-upped that in the second half by scoring 71. Prior to this week, the Golden Lions hadn’t scored more than 66 points in a half since at least 2010. UAPB had not scored more than 125 points in a game in that same span.
