The Nevada men’s basketball team bounced back from a 17-point loss to Washington with a 16-point win over San Francisco on Friday at the Acrisure Holiday Classic.
Corey Camper Jr. had a game-high 22 points with a trio of freshmen having a big games, including Ethan Croley (11 points, 10 rebounds), Peyton White (10 points) and Myles Walker (seven).
The game featured 13 lead changes in the first half before Nevada dominated after intermission. The Wolf Pack led 38-37 at the break before outscoring the Dons by 15 points in the second half.
Both teams struggled on offense to start before Nevada got to the free throw line to find some rhythm on that side of the ball later in the first half. The Wolf Pack then made 60 percent of its shots in the second half while shutting down the Dons, a 3-point heavy team that made just 7-of-23 threes (30.4 percent). Nevada was 7-of-14 (50 percent) from beyond the arc.
Nevada made 30-of-63 shots (47.7 percent) while holding San Francisco to 19-of-49 shooting (38.8 percent). The Wolf Pack had just four turnovers while forcing 15 takeaways. Nevada held San Francisco’s top scorer, Ryan Beasley, to three points on 0-of-6 shooting before he fouled out in 31 minutes. He entered the game averaging 15.5 points per game.
Croley stepped up in place of injured starting center Joel Armotrading and made 5-of-7 shots to tally his 11 points with five offensive and five defensive rebounds. Power forward Elijah Price added 11 points.
Nevada improved to 5-3 after splitting two games in Palm Desert and has three non-league games left with home contests against UC San Diego and Duquesne and a road game at Washington State before Mountain West action begins.