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Georgetown enjoys laugher ahead of early Big East showdowns

Dec 24, 2008 - 7:16 AM WASHINGTON (Ticker) -- Austin Freeman scored 17 points, Chris Wright had 14 and DaJuan Summers added 13 to lift ninth-ranked Georgetown to a 76-38 victory over Florida International on Tuesday.

The Hoyas (9-1) jumped to a 23-4 lead in the game's first nine and a half minutes and had a 43-16 lead at the half.

It will likely be Georgetown's last easy win for a while. The Hoyas open their Big East Conference slate on Monday at second-ranked Connecticut. They then face No. 3 Pittsburgh and No. 11 Notre Dame.

Freeman was 6-of-9 shots from the field, including 5-of-6 from the arc. Wright added seven assists and Summers had five rebounds. Freshman center Greg Monroe scored 10 points, had six rebounds and five steals.

"I think we're anxious to start Big East play, it's like the second half of the season, and now we need to focus on the next part of the season," Wright said. "We had a tough non-conference schedule....We have a tough stretch of games coming up and we need to be prepared for it."

The Hoyas opened the game with 3-pointers by Wright and Freeman for a 6-0 lead in the game's first minute. The Golden Panthers pulled within 9-4, but the Hoyas held them without a basket for 6:49 as the lead grew to 23-4 on a three by Wright with 10:03 to play in the half.

The Golden Panthers (4-9) shot 23 percent (6-of-26) from the field in the first half as Georgetown pulled away.

"That's a good basketball team," Florida International coach Sergio Rouco said. "I think we've played two Final Four teams this year. I think UCLA and Georgetown have an opportunity to be Final Four teams."

Michael Dominguez led Florida International with 20 points.

"Well we expected when we went into this game when we contracted it last year that I would have 13 scholarship kids playing, that's number one. Unfortunately, we don't have all our kids," Rouco said. "When you come to play a number nine ranked team in the country, which by the way, they are a very good basketball team and they started out on fire, and they made a lot of shots, and we didn't make our shots its hard to come back."