Strong Second Half Pushes George Mason Past American to 10-1

December 7, 2019

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On Saturday, George Mason (10-1) defeated American (3-5) 68-53 to continue their best start since 1984.

The first half was rough. Like really rough. Xavier Johnson, AJ Wilson and Javon Greene all had to sit with 2 fouls and combined for just eight points.

Not to mention, George Mason went nearly 9 minutes without a field goal, and scored just two field goals in the final 11 minutes of the first half. As poorly as they played, the Patriots only trailed by three points, on an American three just before the buzzer.

The second half could not have been more different. George Mason outscored American 41-23, and that margin should have been larger, had the Patriots not given up seven points in the final minute of the game with the end-of-the-bench on the floor for Mason.

Mason found their identity in the second half just driving the ball right at the bucket, getting to the line attempting 25 free throws on the night. Javon Greene, Justin Kier and Xavier Johnson stepped up big time, especially in the final 20 minutes, combining for 28 of Mason’s 41 points in the second half.

Justin lead the team in scoring with 14 points. XJ had arguably his best performance of the season with a strong 12 points and 9 boards and Javon added 13 points.

Also, we need to talk about EBA tonight. Y’all ROCKED. We’ve been harping a lot this season about lack of energy in the arena, but tonight, y’all took a big step forward. We actually had three rows of students standing (not great, but a HUGE improvement!), and the arena as a whole just had so much energy tonight, and you could feel the players feeding off of that.