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PROVO -- The BYU basketball team's backcourt showed just how dominant they can be in Tuesday night's 87-53 victory over Idaho State.
Junior guards Jimmer Fredette (22 points) and Jackson Emery (19 points) combined for 41 points, 10 rebounds, five assists and six steals, while committing only three turnovers.
While Fredette's offensive production was business as usual, Emery was happy to have bounced back from a rough offensive start to the season.
"Like I told you, I got all my misses out the other night," said Emery, who matched his career high in scoring, and achieved a new career high in rebounds (seven) and 3-pointers made (five). "You're going to miss shots. Everyone misses shots. But you can't let it get to you mentally. I guess the biggest thing is you just can't force stuff."
Emery single-handedly took control of the game in the first half after his team got off to a slow offensive start. The junior from Lone Peak High School in nearby Alpine ignited his team with an 8-0 run; dropping in two three-pointers and two free throws.
"In those situations you just have to give the team a spark. And once we get a spark we're hard to stop," Emery said. "I just made a couple of plays when it was my turn."
BYU Head Coach Dave Rose said he was happy to see Emery play with such confidence.
"That's a good sign, to see him shoot with confidence and be successful because he's a really good shooter," Rose said. "He shoots the ball really well in practice." The Bengals kept it interesting for the first ten minutes of the game, staying within five points with a score of 21-16. The Cougars put the Bengals away with their best defensive effort of the season, recording seven blocks and 10 steals and scoring 25 points off turnovers.
BYU had a stretch in which they scored 15 unanswered points and Rose attributed that success to the defensive play of his big men.
"I think our post guys did a terrific job of getting up on screens tonight, and stopping the penetration," Rose said. "I give a lot of credit to Brandon (Davies), Chris (Miles), and Noah (Hartsock) and JT (Jonathan Tavernari) for being up on those screens on time. We were late a lot against Bradley and got ourselves in foul trouble, and tonight I thought we did a better job executing that.
Tavernari, the Cougars' second leading scorer from last year had another poor shooting performance, making only two of his twelve attempts. Rose said he expects the senior's shooting to come around.
The Bengals were led by Amorrow Morgan, who finished with 13 points and three rebounds.
The Cougars will hit the road for their next game. They travel to Honolulu for a Friday night matchup against Hawaii.
Tip-off is at 10:00 p.m. MST.
A win in Friday's game against Hawaii would be Rose's 100th as the BYU head coach.
