Arkansas Little Rock vs. DePaul recap: Blue Demons fall to undefeated Trojans

They say what goes up, must come down eventually.  Saturday, what came down was Dave Leitao's Blue Demons. as DePaul had one of their worst games so far this season, falling to the Arkansas Little Rock Trojans by a score of 66-44.  While DePaul's streak came to an end, Little Rock's continues as they are now off the to best start in their program's history with a now 8-0 record on the season.

Whether it was an off night, or Little Rock was just too much for DePaul to handle, the Blue Demons were essentially knocked out of the game from the onset.  DePaul did lead for a total of 21 seconds over the course of 40 minutes of play, but looking at the statistics is was a rather poor showing for Dave Leitao's team, especially coming off of a fairly decent showing against Drake earlier in the week.

As a team the Blue Demons shot 39% from all areas of the floor, 11% from three point range with only one three pointer made on nine attempts, and 56% from the foul line. In terms of point production, DePaul only scored four points off their bench compared to Little Rock's 27 bench points, but were pretty active in the in the paint matching Little Rock's 22 points. DePaul also turned over the ball 20 times over the course of the game, whereas the Trojans only turned over the ball nine times.  In terms of points off the turnover, Little Rock were able to generate 27 points off of DePaul's loose hands, whereas the Blue Demons only scored a measly two points off the turnover.  Oddly enough those DePaul did win the battle on the boards with 34 total rebounds to Little Rock's 29.

DePaul's leading scorer on the night was Myke Henry who finished the night with 16 points, though most of his production came in the first half, where he had 12 points. In light of his lack of production in the second half, Eli Cain became the secondary scoring option as he finished the night with 12 points.  It was also a quiet night for Billy Garrett Jr., and Tommy Hamilton, as Garrett Jr., only got two points the whole game and Hamilton finished with eight points.

For Little Rock as a team they shot 41% from all areas of the floor, 30% from three point range, and 80% from the foul line.  Josh Hagins led the way with a game leading 19 points, his efforts were also aided greatly by Marcus Johnson Jr., who finished with 13 points on the night as well.  Lis Shoshi led the game in rebounds with seven on the night and Hagins also had the game leading mark in assists with eight on the game, which was one more than DePaul had combined as a team.

This is the difficult stretch of nonconference games for DePaul before heading into conference play. Next up on the docket are games against Stanford, Northwestern, and George Washington.  For Dave Leitao's team this is the final tune up, and they may need to make some significant adjustments before before their first Big East game against Georgetown on December 30th.