FOUL MOOD: Tops send Jax State to line 50 times in loss
Published 2:00 am Friday, February 6, 2026
Hank Plona had to be in a foul mood by the end of Thursday night at E.A. Diddle Arena.
In the aftermath of a 71-66 home loss to Conference USA rival Jacksonville State, the second-year Western Kentucky men’s basketball coach certainly took note of his opponent’s staggering 50 free-throw attempts and the 31 fouls called against his team – while Jax State was whistled for just 18 in an unquestionably physical game.
All those free throws added up to 36 points for the Gamecocks – 15 more at the line than the Tops scored and more than enough to decide the outcome.
“I felt like they came in here trying to be cute and manipulate and do whatever it took to win the foul game,” Plona said of Jax State. “It looked like they wanted a review on everything we did. And they were just trying to plow it to the basket and jump into us. I thought a lot of their plays were odd looking to me. At the same time as the game went on, we lost our composure and our discipline in some areas, and there were some fouls and some plays that we can’t make. So when teams are trying to muck it up and try to get a little chippy with you, which I thought it appeared to me that was clearly their game plan at the beginning of the game, I didn’t think we handled that as a championship-level, mature team.”
If getting to the free-throw line by any means possible was the plan for Jax State (12-10 overall, 7-4 CUSA), it was a winning strategy for the Gamecocks. And all those fouls led to collateral damage for WKU (12-11, 5-7 CUSA), which had two players ejected on technical fouls and another foul out late in the second half.
WKU graduate senior point guard Terrion Murdix was the first to go after picking up his second technical foul after catching an elbow to the face from the Gamecocks’ Jacoby Hill and responding with a shove with 17:29 left in the game.
Hilltoppers freshman guard Armelo Boone was next, exiting the game after drawing a flagrant 2 foul with 7:16 to go that led to an immediate ejection.
Senior forward Grant Newell lasted until just 2:04 remained, when he picked up his fifth foul defending a drive by Jax State’s Mostapha El Moutaouakkil.
All those losses, combined with leading scorer Teagan Moore’s absence for the fourth straight game after suffering a head injury against Liberty on Jan. 21, left the Tops considerably thinned out by the final two minutes.
WKU was still very much in the game – Moutaouakkil’s free throw put his team up just 66-64 after Newell’s foul. On the ensuing possession, the Tops nearly took the lead back on redshirt junior guard Cade Stinnett’s 3-pointer from the corner – the shot rolled around the rim and fell off.
“Have to shoot it – it was halfway down,” Plona said of Stinnett’s attempt. “He’s out there because he has the ability to do it.”
Jax State collected the rebound after the miss, but promptly turned the ball over to give the Tops another chance. Ryan Myers missed a jumper, the Gamecocks again collected the rebound then missed a pair of layups but pulled down three offensive rebounds before finally drawing another foul. Hill hit one free throw to push the lead to three at 67-64 with 31 seconds left.
The Tops again came up empty on their next possession, then Hill drew another foul and iced the game with two more free throws with 17 seconds left that stretched the lead to five points.
“We weren’t very efficient this game,” Newell said. “Neither team was, but something that really stood out — I feel like even though we weren’t very efficient, if we would have just kept the fouls down, I feel like we still would have been able to get this win.”
The Tops got off to another ragged start, missing their first 11 field-goal attempts but stayed out front by getting to the foul line early. Jax State used a 12-4 run to take a 22-19 lead and held a 33-28 advantage at the half.
WKU opened the second half with a 15-7 surge to lead 43-40 with 14:05 to play before the game turned into battle at the free-throw line – the Gamecocks connected for 14 over the final minutes.
“We definitely should have, could have fouled less,” Myers said. “We need to use our length, just being on a string more defensively as a team and just being overall more efficient on both ends, as in just executing and making the winning plays.”
Myers finished with a game-high 20 points to lead the Tops. LJ Hackman added 17 points, Boone had 11 and Newell tallied 10 for his seventh straight double-digit scoring performance.
After shooting just 18.8% (6-of-32) in the first half, WKU warmed up a bit in the second half and ended the game shooting 19-of-62 (30.6%) from the field.
The Tops were on the mark at the free-throw line, hitting 21-of-24 compared to the Gamecocks’ 36-of-50 effort – but the sheer volume of tries proved enough to secure the win.
“I thought (Marcus) Fitzgerald had a basket that was called a foul late where he jumped into us underneath the basket, and I thought LJ Hackman was demolished trying to score,” Plona said. “I didn’t think they were trying to score. I thought they were trying to get fouled. We try to score, so maybe I’m wrong for teaching our guys to try and score. But the discrepancy – I mean, bottom line statistically that’s the ballgame.”
The victory was the fourth straight against the Tops for Jax State coach Ray Harper – who was the head coach at WKU for five seasons (2012-16) before resigning his job in the wake of a trio of suspensions on his team shortly after the 2016 season. Harper is now 4-4 all-time against his former program.
The Hilltoppers remain home to host Florida International on Saturday at 2 p.m. The Panthers are 11-11 overall and 4-7 in CUSA after winning on the road 88-84 against Middle Tennessee on Wednesday. It will be the first meeting between the two schools this season, with ESPN+ set to live stream the game.
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