ARLINGTON – Less than 48 hours removed from a heartbreaking loss, the UT Arlington men's basketball team (10-13, 6-6 Sun Belt) bounced back impressively on the strength of its long-range shooting as the Mavericks cruised to a 68-54 win over ULM (6-15, 2-10 Sun Belt) Saturday afternoon inside the College Park Center.
 
UTA knocked down 13 3-pointers – its most this season versus a Division-I opponent – and behind a game-high 17 points from Sam Griffin and 15 points off the bench by Radshad Davis had no problem dispatching ULM for the second time in two weeks by double figures.
 
Jabari Narcis registered his fifth double-double of the year with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Those five double-doubles are more than four Sun Belt teams have accounted for on the season. The 6-foot-9 forward knocked down three 3-pointers on the day to help lead the Maverick charge from beyond the arc.
 
Davis had a career day from the 3-point arc, tying for his most triples in a game with four – which are the junior college transfer's most in a UTA uniform. Griffin also equaled his career best with four triples – his most since the season opener against UT Dallas and personal high against a D-I foe. It's now the fourth time the true freshman has led UTA in scoring this season.
 
Coming off a heartbreaking buzzer-beating one-point loss to Louisiana on Thursday which landed at the #1 spot on SportsCenter's Top 10 Plays, UTA answered emphatically as the Mavs trailed for only one minute the entire contest, led by as much as 21 in the 2nd half and evened their league record at .500 – placing themselves firmly in the Sun Belt regular-season race with still eight conference contests remaining.
 
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE
The Mavs shot 47 percent (26-55) from the floor and posted a season-best 46 percent (13-28) from 3-point range while holding ULM to 40 percent (23-57) and 29 percent (4-14), respectively.
 
UTA's leading scorer David Azore had his stretch of 21-straight double-figure scoring games snapped as the redshirt sophomore scored just two points on 1-4 shooting, but he was still heavily involved as the Houston native issued a career-best eight assists against only two turnovers.
 
Brian Warren – UTA's second-leading scorer – netted just six points, but the senior guard dished out six assists of his own and didn't commit a turnover as part of UTA's stalwart 20-5 assist-to-turnover total as the Mavs had assists on all but six made field goals. Combined with four turnovers on Thursday, UTA committed just nine total giveaways in the two contests this weekend.
 
All 10 of UTA's wins have now come when it has led at the half, shot 40+ percent from the floor and had a better 3-point percentage than its opponent.
 
Tyree White led ULM with 11 points, while Michael Ertel collected 10 for the Warhwaks, who actually won the rebounding battle, 37-30, after facing a -26 rebound differential in the meeting in Monroe two weeks ago. However, the shorthanded Warhawks dropped their eighth in a row and are now 0-10 on the road this season.
 
THEY SAID IT – Head Coach Chris Ogden
"I really like the way we played – starting with 20 assists and only five turnovers. We were looking for each other, and we can really shoot the ball well when we do that. I've been telling the guys that we're going to play our best basketball in February and March, and today was just the beginning. We're still not there, but it was a good start – we played very intelligent; we didn't foul a lot and offensively we played with a purpose."
 
1ST-HALF RUNDOWN
Behind Narcis, UTA quickly built an eight-point lead, 20-12, not even seven minutes into the contest. ULM countered and got its deficit down to one on multiple occasions, including 26-25, but the Mavs were able to close the stanza on an extended 9-0 run and held the Warhawks without a point over the final 5:45.
 
That created a 10-point halftime lead for UTA, 35-25, on the strength of 48-percent shooting (14-29) while limiting ULM to 33 percent (11-33) as the Warhawks missed their final 10 shots of the half.
 
Narcis registered eight points and eight rebounds in the 1st half, while Griffin led all scorers with 10. UTA – which only averages eight 3-point makes per game – knocked down six in the opening period to help open up that locker-room cushion.
 
2ND-HALF RUNDOWN
After UTA's 12-point advantage early in the stanza got cut to seven on two occasions – the last of which was 44-37 with 13 minutes to play – the Mavs responded with 3-pointers on four possessions. The first came courtesy of TiAndre Jackson-Young, and the last three consecutively from Davis, who clipped off three in a row in 90 seconds to cap a 12-1 Mav run and put the game out of reach, 56-38, with nine minutes remaining.
 
From there ULM never got any closer than 16 until a closing layup just before the buzzer provided the final 14-point margin.
 
THIS AND THAT

• Jackson-Young scored five points off the bench … Nicolas Elame registered four points – his most in a Sun Belt game … Jordan Phillips tallied four points in a starting role and also grabbed four rebounds.
• UTA held an 11-0 advantage in fastbreak points.
• Azore had reached double-figure points in every game this year except the season opener in which he registered seven points against UT Dallas.
• That contest against UT Dallas also represents UTA's season high in 3-pointers made with 15.
• UTA led for 35:52, trailed for just 1:02 and the contest was tied on three occasions.
• The Mavs were without Patrick Mwamba for the 17th-straight game with a broken foot.
• Five of UTA's six Sun Belt losses have been by six points or less. Ten of its 13 losses overall have been by eight points or less, including five to Quad 1 or 2 opponents.
• Despite their record, the Mavs came into Saturday as the 2nd-highest ranked Sun Belt team in the NET Rankings at #119 (Georgia State #109).
• UTA coaches and staff wore blue puzzle-piece pins as part of a nation-wide effort this weekend to raise awareness and money for autism through Coaches Powering Forward for Autism benefiting Autism Speaks.

NEXT UP
UTA will be back on the road for its final two-game road swing of the season when the Mavs travel to the Carolinas to face Appalachian State (Feb. 6) and Coastal Carolina (Feb. 8).
 
PURCHASE TICKETS
Season tickets start as low as $99, and tickets for all home games are available by visiting UTATickets.com, calling the UTA Box Office at (817) 272-9595 or by stopping by the College Park Center during regular business hours.
 
FOLLOW ALONG
For updates, behind-the-scenes photos, videos and more engaging and personal content, be sure to follow the men's basketball program on Twitter (@UTAMavsMBB), Instagram (@UTAMavsMBB) and Facebook (/UTAMavsMBB).